School counseling in Israel. Issues and developments

This study investigated how Israeli teacher-counselors view their actual performance and what it is that teacher-counselors themselves feel should be their ideal roles. Counseling services were introduced into the educational system in Israel in 1960. Due to the fact that there was an urgent need to help students in their vocational plans and with their learning difficulties (Klingman and Ajzen, 1978), supervisors in The Ministry of Education suggested that teachers who have at least three years of teaching experience start a two year in-service training program in order to prepare them as specialists in helping pupils in the elementary schools plan for their future. A second objective was to help exceptional children with their learning problems. These goals caused the teacher with two years of special training to add a new role to his/her educational and teaching role. This dual role has been called ‘Teacher-counselor.’ In 1960, thirty four teacher-counselors started their work in different schools in Israel. Their major work was concentrated on disadvantaged children and with 7th and 8th graders helping them with their learning difficulties. To prevent overlapping with other helping professions and confusion concerning this new profession, a follow up study was conducted by Malinovski and Malinovski (1964) in order to define the role of the teacher-counselor. They have defined it to include eight activities which teacher-counselors were found to be involved with:

1. Help students adjust to school and community.
2. Help students reach self-understanding.
3. Provide information needed for vocational plans.
4. Help students understand their interests, values, and aptitudes.
5. Help students in human relationships.
6. To be a consultant for teachers and other professional workers.
7. Help parents in decision making concerning vocational plans for their children, and assist them in coping with behavioral problems.
8. Referral to special institutions when needed.

Since its origins in 1960, school counseling in Israel has been developed rapidly. This is reflected especially in the increasing number of teacher-counselors (43 teacher-counselors in 1964 to 800 teacher-counselors in 1976 and to 1366 teacher-counselors in 1981). Teacher-counselors now work not only in the Ministry of Education but also in the Ministry of Labor providing vocational services to teenagers who dropped out of school and who are encouraged to work and learn at the same time. As mentioned earlier, originally teacher-counselors were certified teachers who were selected after three years of experience in teaching and then they participated in a two-year program of in service training to become teacher-counselors. This state of affairs did remain for long. Soon after the introduction of the counseling services, universities responded to the newly created need and developed academic programs (for B.A. and then M.A. degrees) in counseling education. This evolution in training programs took place in the mid 1960's and brought a new sense of professionalism to the field of counseling. Until the mid seventies, universities limited admissions to counselor training to only those candidates who were already certified teachers with at least three years of experience. Currently, admission is not limited to teachers only but includes ‘fresh’ in-experienced students who can be admitted when they qualify on two criteria: Academic achievement and personality variables. The latter development has two significant meanings. First, the quality of students has become higher as they are selected from a larger population. Second, it is well known in Israel that for the teaching profession there exists what is called in Israel ‘negative selection: the less able go to teacher training seminaries to become teachers. Thus, by limiting admission to programs of training counselors only to graduates of these seminaries, the educational system's weaknesses were perpetuated. By widening the range of potential candidates not only has the quality of students and departments greatly improved, but also the educational system has gained much from these highly able counselors even though they are less experienced.