2 weeks

GRADE: HUMSS- 12

SUBJECT TITLE: Disciplines and Ideas in the Applied Social Sciences

SEMESTER: First Semester, S.Y. 2020- 2021

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MODULE 3

Lesson THE PROFESSIONALS AND PRACTITIONERS

3 IN THE DISCIPLINE OF COUNSELING

Professionals and Practitioners in the Discipline of counseling

The two most well-known professional titles in the counseling field are
psychiatrist and psychologist. While both study counseling theory and practice
psychotherapy, only a psychiatrist is typically licensed to prescribe medication.
Professionals. The main criteria for professionals include the following but not
limited to:
1. Expert and specialized knowledge in field which one is practicing
professionally.
2. A high standard of professional ethics, behaviour and work activities while
carrying out one's profession (as an employee, self-employed person, career,
enterprise, business, company, or partnership/associate/colleague, etc.). The
professional owes a higher duty to a client, often a privilege of confidentiality,
as well as a duty not to abandon the client just because he or she may not be
able to pay or remunerate the professional.
3. Reasonable work morale and motivation. Having interest and desire to do a
job well as holding positive attitude towards the profession are important
elements in attaining a high level of professionalism.
4. A professional is an expert who is a master in a specific field.
Practitioners. As far as practitioner goes, defines it as someone who "engages in
an occupation, profession, religion, or way of life. Practitioner may refer to a medical
practitioner or justice practitioner."

INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES:

 Describe the roles, functions, and competencies of counselors;

 Identify areas of specialization where counselors work
 Illustrate the different career opportunities of counselors through a
graphic organizer.

3.1. Defining the Roles, Functions, and Competencies of Counselors

Roles of Guidance Counselors
Given that the youth are the future of every nation, the role of providing guidance
to them at critical moments of their growth is a serious nation-building undertaking.
Counseling is a process and a relationship between the client(s) and counselor. The
role of the counselor is to assist the person or persons (clients) in realizing a change in
behavior or attitude, to assist them to seek achievement of goals, assist them to find
help, and in some cases, the role of counselors includes the teaching of social skills,
effective communication, spiritual guidance, decision- making, and career choices. A
counselor's roles may sometimes include aiding one in coping with a crisis. In some
settings, counseling includes premarital and marital counseling, grief and loss (divorce,
death, or amputation), domestic violence and other types of abuse, special counseling
situations like terminal illness (death and dying) as well as counseling of emotionally
and mentally disturbed individuals. Counseling could be short-term (brief counseling) or
long- term.

Functions of Guidance Counselors

The Philippine Republic Act No. 9258 (Sec. 2-3) defines a guidance counselor as
a natural person who has been professionally registered and licensed by a legitimate
state entity and by virtue of specialized training to perform the functions of guidance and
counseling. The guidance counselor's functions include the use of an integrated
approach to develop a well-functioning individual primarily through:

1. helping a client develop potentials to the fullest;

2. helping a client plan to utilize his or her potentials to the fullest;
3. helping a client plan his or her future in accordance with his or her abilities, interests,
and needs;
4. sharing and applying knowledge related to counseling such as counseling theories,
tools, and techniques; and
5. administering a wide range of human development services

Competencies of Guidance Counselors

Guidance counselors have the ability to administer and maintain career guidance
and counseling programs. They are capable of properly guiding the students toward
becoming productive and contributing individuals through informed career choices with
reference to appropriate bureaus, relevant stakeholders, and national programs, and in
light of the available opportunities in the country, and globally. They are capable of
designing and implementing programs that expose students to the world and value of
work and guide, provide, and equip the students with the necessary life skills and
values.
They can administer career advocacy activities. These are activities that are
designed to guide secondary-level students in choosing the career tracks that they
intend to pursue. They also involve provision of career information and experiences,
advising, coordinating and making referrals, career talks, career and job fairs, parents'
orientations, and conducting seminar-workshops on career decision-making.
Guidance counselors are capable career advocates. They can conduct career
advocacy activities for secondary-level students of the schools in employment sites.
They can collaborate various-government agencies, student organizations, industry
associations, guidance and counseling associations, professional associations, and
other relevant stakeholders to foster student understanding and appreciation of the
world of work and to prepare better and aspire for it.
Guidance counselors can facilitate conduct of career advocacy in collaboration
with career advocates and peer facilitators. The career advocates are not necessarily
registered and licensed guidance counselors but they provide direct guidance on career
and employment guidance. They include homeroom advisers and teachers of all
learning areas who can implement career advocacy activities. Peer facilitators, on the
other hand, are secondary-level students trained to assist career advocates in
implementing career advocacy activities.
Other Competencies that Apply to the Broader Counseling Work
There are many competencies that apply to almost all kinds of counseling
contexts but not uniformly. Different authors have thematized them differently.
Egan (2002) calls them the three-stage theory of counseling and marks out three
broad competencies for a counselor that includes:

Stage I: What's going on? This involves helping clients to clarify the key
issues calling for change

Stage II: What solutions make sense for me? This involves helping clients
determine outcomes.

Stage III: What do I have to do to get what I need or want? This involve
helping
clients develop strategies for accomplishing goals.
Many other writers also use a three-stage model that looks at this working
relationship as having a beginning, middle, and end (Culley & Bond 2004; Smith 2008).
Alistair Ross (2003) provides a similar model: starting out, moving on and letting go.
However, stage models have less use for many informal educators. The sort of
relationship generally involved in informal and community counseling does not generally
involve an explicit contract, and the time, duration, and frequency of encounters are
highly variable. Endings can be extremely abrupt, for example. This said, by focusing on
beginnings, middles, and endings such models do help us to think about what might be
involved at different moments in relationships and to develop appropriate responses
(Smith 2008).
Much of the literature around helping and helping relationships explores 'helping
skills' (Carkoff 2000; Egan 2002; Shulman 1979; Young 1998). The critical skills pertain
to the process of fostering conversation and exploration. The tradition of professional
counseling requires trainees to possess a set of skills and a body of knowledge to study
in the curriculum of accumulated scientific knowledge and the skills needed to be an
effective helper in counseling.
Culley and Bond (2004) have described all these as foundation skills. They have
grouped these foundation skills around three headings: attending and listening,
reflective skills, and probing skills.
1. Attending and listening. Attending and listening skills refer to active
listening, which means listening with purpose and responding in such a way that
clients are aware that they have both been heard and understood. (Culley &
Bond 2004)
2. Reflective skills. These skills are concerned with the other person's frame of
reference. For Culley and Bond (2004), reflective skills 'capture' what the client is
saying and plays it back to them-but in the counselor's own words. The key skills
are restating, paraphrasing, and summarizing; for instance, the counselor may
begin with, "Did you mean to say...?". (Culley & Bond 2004)

3. Probing skills. These skills facilitate going deeper, asking more directed or
leading questions (leading in the sense that they move the conversation in a
particular direction). Culley and Bond (2004) looked at the different forms that
questions can take (and how they can help or inhibit exploration), and the role of
making statements. Making statements is seen as generally gentler, less
intrusive, and less controlling than asking questions-although that does depend
on the statement. Probing tends to increase the helper's control over both
process and content, and as a result, "should be used sparingly and with care,
particularly in the early stages of counseling" (Culley & Bond 2004). As Alistair
Ross (2003) has commented, counseling skills such as these are important and
can be developed through reflection and training. However, no matter how good
a person's skills are, they must be matched by relational qualities. Counselors
also need to be strong in their relational qualities. The distinction between good
and poor practitioner lies in the belief system of the helper, and how it translates
into helping the relationship that he/she puts forward. (Combs & Gonzales 1994)
Elsewhere and across applied social science disciplines, there are four
common skills that require studying the curriculum of accumulated scientific
knowledge across disciplines, which are skills for communicating motivating,
problem solving, and resolving conflicts.
1. Communication skills. These include the ability to actively listen,
demonstrate understanding, ask appropriate questions, and provide information
as needed. Active listening involves listening to the words, the gestures, and
other body language. It involves listening for what is said and what is not said. It
requires listening to content-its meaning and the emotions behind the it.
Demonstrating understanding includes responding to what is said by repeating
the same words or using other words, stating the meaning of the words, and
describing the feelings that accompany the words.
Effective communication means the message you want to communicate is
received as you intended it to be received. However, it is common for the
intended message to be misunderstood. This happens because people have
different ways of saying things or similar statements may have different
meanings for some people. Understanding the communication cycle (Sender »
Message » Channel» Receiver » Feedback) and the barriers (noise,
interruptions, uncomfortable surroundings, stereotyping, message complexity,
misstatements) that can get in the way of effective communication are very
important for developing communication skills.
2. Motivational skills. These skills are the ones that influence a helpee to take
action after the helping session or consultation. There is an old saying, "You can
lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink" Sometimes, we label students
as being 'hard-headed' because of their non-compliance with suggestions. But
we do not reflect on the why and how come. There are varied theories related to
this skill area. Needs, desires, incentives, drive, cognitive dissonance, and other
factors have been purported to motivate behaviors. Recognizing the client's
readiness for action must be considered. Does the client have the necessary
knowledge, skills, or ability to perform the necessary tasks to correct the problem
area? Are there (attitudinal) concerns interfering with taking action?
 3. Problem-solving skills. These include differentiating between symptoms and
the problem, pinpointing probable causes and triggers for the problem, and then
generating a range of possible solutions to the actual problem.

4. Conflict resolution skills. These involve learning about styles of conflict

resolution. It also includes recognizing the signs of it and learning the process of
conflict resolution. Helping professionals should have the skills to facilitate
communication and problem solving between parties that are having a conflict as
well as to help them focus on facts rather than personalities or blaming one
another. Skills here are necessary in unblocking some barriers that are inevitable
to counseling. Skill building in this area is important.

3.2. Areas of Specialization where Counselors Work

Counselors are practically found in all spheres of human development, transitions,

and caregiving. Peterson and Nesenholz (1987) identified 11 major areas:

1. Child development and counseling. Child development and counseling as area of

specialization includes parent education, preschool counseling, early childhood
education, elementary school counseling, child counseling in mental health
agencies, and counseling with battered and abused children and their families.

2. Adolescent development and counseling. Adolescent development and

counseling as area of specialization covers middle and high school counseling,
psychological education, career development specialist, adolescent counseling in
mental health agencies, youth work in a residential facility, and youth probation
officer.

3. Gerontology (the aged). Gerontological counseling (the aged) as area of

specialization is considered the fastest growing field and essentially involves
counseling of older citizens. It includes preretirement counseling, community
centers, counseling, nursing home counseling, and hospice work.

4. Marital relationship counseling. Marital or relationship counseling includes

premarital counseling, marriage counseling, family counseling, sex education,
sexual dysfunction counseling, and divorce mediation.

5. Health. Health as an area of specialization offers possibility for nutrition

counseling, exercise and health education, nurse-counselor, rehabilitation
counseling, stress management counseling, holistic health counseling, anorexia
or bulimia counseling, and genetic counseling.

6. Career/lifestyle. As an area of specialization, career and lifestyle counseling

includes guidance on choices and decision-making pertaining to career or
lifestyle; guidance on career development; provision of educational and
occupational information to clients; conducting education on career and lifestyle
trends; provision of various forms of vocational assessment appropriate to a
setting; addressing the career and life development needs of special populations
and appropriate career services in given settings; facilitation of work related
 activities as an integral part of development and formation across the lifespan;
modeling application of decision-making across the lifespan; information
dissemination of current career, vocational, education, occupational, and labor
market information; giving assistance to clients on developing skills necessary to
plan, organize, implement, administer, and evaluate clients own career
development; facilitating understanding of the interrelationships among work,
family, and other life roles and factors including diversity and gender their
influence on career development and choices; identification of ethical and legal
considerations, characteristics and behaviors that influence career; and may also
include provision of needed skills in managing or going through job interviews.

7. College and university. College and university as an area of specialization offer

the following opportunities: college student counseling, student activities, student
personnel work, residential hall or dormitory counselor, and counselor educator.

8. Drugs. Drugs as area of specialization has several options such as substance

abuse counseling, alcohol counseling, drug counseling, stop smoking program
manager, and crisis intervention counseling.

9. Consultation. Consultation as an area of specialization covers agency and

corporate consulting, organizational development director, industrial psychology
specialist, and training manager.

10. Business and industry. Business and industry areas of specialization include
training and development personnel, quality and work-life or quality circles
manager, employee assistance programs manager, employee career
development officer, affirmative action, or equal opportunity specialist.

11. Other specialties. Other specialties may include phobia counseling, agoraphobia,
self-management, intra-personal management, interpersonal relationships
management, and grief counseling.
In all specialties, the counselor could be self-employed as a private practitioner or
may be employed by the agency, which may be a government or a non-government
organization (NGO). In any specialty area, additional education and trainings beyond
graduate and post-graduate education are required.

3.3. Career Opportunities for Counselors

Career opportunities for counselors cover corporate environment in human

resources departments, school student services departments, academe, NGOs, court,
detentions and prison setting, as well as in a wide range of human development service
providers. They can work as individual professionals or as members of a team or as
employees in agencies and departments that deal with people.
Educational and school counselors. They offer personal, educational, social,
and academic counseling services. The professionals often work in elementary school,
high school, or university settings to help students assess their abilities and resolve
personal or social problems, and do so in tandem with teachers and school
administrators.
Vocational or career counselors. These professionals facilitate career
decision- making. They aid individuals or groups in determining jobs that are best suited
 to their needs, skills, and interests. In some cases, they may also help clients who are
already employed to improve their skills, including how to manage work related stress or
burnout. This can also stretch to providing support to individual who lost their jobs. For
those seeking jobs, they also provide skills such as practicing for an interview and
developing a meaningful and acceptable resume.
Marriage and family counselors. These professionals offer a wide range of
services for couples and families. They help couples and families deal with social
issues, emotional problems, and in some cases, mental health treatment. They do
conduct counseling sessions with couples or the entire family unit.
Addictions and behavioral counselors. These professionals work with people
suffering from addictions. These may range from drugs, alcohol, sex, eating disorder, to
gambling. They help family members who have been affected by the addicts' actions to
deal well with the situation and as much as possible survive the wounds.
Mental health counselors. These professionals work with people suffering from
mental or psychological distress such as anxiety, phobias, depression, grief, esteem
issues, trauma, substance abuse, and related issues. They aim at promoting mental
health. Their clients can be individuals undergoing treatment; that is why mental health
counselors often work as part of a treatment team. In treatment centers or facilities,
counselors have physicians, psychologists, social workers, and other health care
professionals as their treatment team.
Rehabilitation counselors. These professionals are engaged with individuals
suffering from physical or emotional disabilities. In many cases, such disabilities may
even affect their family, social, school, or work life. Rehabilitation counselors provide
services such as evaluation of the strengths and limitations of clients. The goal is to
facilitate the rehabilitation process and prevent relapse. To that end, they provide
personal and vocational counseling. They can provide effective case management
support that may include, but not limited to, arranging for medical care, vocational
training, and even job placement.
There are individuals who may have experienced an injury and this group of
professionals can help in making the transition back into the workforce. Generally, they
serve as advocates for their clients. Dealing with post-trauma management and self-
acceptance issues can be very complex and too hard to endure. These professionals
step up to help their clients connect well with other services, maximize their ability to
live, and work independently.
Genetics counselors. These professionals operate in a very specialized context
of dealing with genetic information for individuals and the decisions that come with it.
The common area here is counseling parents who are concerned with determining if
their potential offspring might be at risk for being born with an inherited disorder or
individual adults themselves who may be at risk of developing a genetic disease such
as heart disease and breast cancer. They help individuals and families to make
informed decisions about their health and to assist them in finding the services that best
meet their needs. Very often, this group of professionals work as members of health
care teams composed of doctors, geneticists, nurses, and social workers.

3.4. Rights, Responsibilities, and Accountabilities of Counselors

 As state registered and licensed professionals, counselors are protected. They
are governed by scientific theories, practices, and processes as well as professional
standards and ethics. They are responsible for the practice of their profession in
accordance with their mandates and professional guidelines and ethics. They are
accountable to their clients, the professional body, and the government. It is critical that
the counselor and the client fully understand the nature of the concerns, which leads to
a contract to take action on a mutually agreed upon problem (Peterson & Nisenholz
1987).

3.5. Code of Ethics of Counselors

As in all professional practices in applied social sciences, counselors must

observe confidentiality at all times. Without confidentiality, clients cannot trust the
counselors and therefore make the profession impossible to practice. Counselors must
not expose anything they hear from their clients in the process of caring for them. The
code of ethics also states that counselors live and work in accordance with the
professional standards of conduct set forth for the practice of guidance and counseling.
They should not do harm to their clients. They should be people of high moral standing.

One of the oldest professional organizations in guidance and counseling is the

Institute of Guidance Counselors, established in 1968, and now a professional body
representing over 1,200 practitioners in secondary schools, colleges, adult guidance
services, and private practice and in other settings (http://www.igc.ie about-us/ code-of-
ethics). Its preamble provides that guidance counselors work with clients. They come as
individuals and in groups. They supply professional services concerning educational,
vocational, and personal/ social development. Guidance counselors must respect the
dignity, integrity, and welfare of these clients. They must work in ways that promote
clients' control over their own lives. They must respect clients' ability to make decisions
and engage in personal change in the light of clients' own beliefs and values.
To protect the clients' interests, the body produced a Code of Ethics for its
members' compliance. The Code makes explicit the values underlying their practice.
The values include an assertion that the work of the guidance counselor involves
a special relationship of trust. That trust is safeguarded and promoted by setting and
monitoring appropriate boundaries in the relationship and making this action explicit to
the client and relevant others. While the relationship with the client is the primary
concern, it does not exist in a social vacuum. For this reason, guidance counselors have
a sensible regard for the social context of their work, which includes the wider
community, the law, and professional colleagues.
The Institute of Guidance Counselors' Code consists of four overall ethical
principles that subsume a number of specific ethical standards:

Principle 1: Respect for the rights and dignity of the client

Guidance counselors honor and promote the fundamental rights, moral
and cultural values, dignity, and worth of clients. They respect clients' rights to
privacy confidentiality, self-determination and autonomy, consistent with the law.
 As far as possible, they ensure that the client understands and consents to
whatever professional action they propose.
Principle 2: Competence
Guidance counselors maintain and update their professional skills. They
recognize the limits of their expertise, engage in self-care, and seek support and
supervision to maintain the standard of their work They offer only those services
for which they are qualified by education, training and experience.
Principle 3: Responsibility
Guidance counselors are aware of their professional responsibility to act in
a trustworthy, reputable, and accountable manner toward clients, colleagues, and
the community in which they work and live. They avoid doing harm, take
responsibility for their professional actions and adopt a systematic approach to
resolving ethical dilemmas.
Principle 4: Integrity
Guidance counselors seek to promote integrity in their practice they
represent themselves accurately and treat others with honesty
straightforwardness, and fairness. They deal actively with conflicts of interest,
avoid exploiting others, and are alert to inappropriate behavior on the part of
colleagues.

Many other similar codes exist with the same expectations for ethical conduct.
The fundamental principles include the following:
Respecting human rights and dignity
Respect for the client's right to be self-governing
A commitment to promoting the client’s well-being
Fostering responsible caring
Fair treatment of all clients and the provision of adequate services
Equal opportunity to clients availing counseling services
Ensuring the integrity of practitioner-client relationship
Fostering the practitioner's self-knowledge and care for self
Enhancing the quality of professional knowledge and its application
Responsibility to the society

The Code of Ethics goes into specifics to detail professional behavior from
respect for fundamental rights, moral and cultural values, dignity and worth of clients to
respect for rights to privacy, confidentiality, self-determination and autonomy, consistent
with the law, and ensuring that the client understands and consents to whatever
professional action they propose. Hence, Codes define parameters for general respect,
privacy and confidentiality, informed consent and freedom of consent, and recognition of
limits of competence.

Reference:
Sampa (2019). DISCIPLINES AND IDEAS IN THE APPLIED SOCIAL SCIENCES(2 nd
Edition). REX Book Store
EVALUATE YOUR SELF:

I. TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE

A. In three sentences, give the difference between the roles and functions
of counselors.
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________

B. Enumerate five (5) competencies that counselors should have.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

C. Briefly describe the following areas of specialization where counselors

work:

1. Child development and counseling

___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
2. Adolescent development and counseling
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
3. Gerontological counseling
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
4. Marital or relationship counseling
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
5. Health
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
6. Phobia counseling
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________

II. CHECK YOUR UNDERSTANDING

A. Through a graphic organizer, illustrate the different career
opportunities of counselors. Include a short description for
each.