Foreword: Developmentally Responsive Middle School Counseling

With the advent of a multi-tiered system of supports (MTSS) in schools, counselor preparation programs are once again challenged to further extend the education and training of pre-service and in-service school counselors. To introduce and contextualize this special issue, an MTSS's intent and foci, as well as its theoretical and research underpinnings, are elucidated. Next, this article aligns MTSS with current professional school counselor standards of the American School Counselor Association's (ASCA) School Counselor Competencies, the 2016 Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) Standards for School Counselors and the ASCA National Model. Using Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) and Response to Intervention (RTI) models as exemplars, recommendations for integrating MTSS into school counselor preparation curriculum and pedagogy are discussed.

As a form of exclusionary discipline, student placement into an alternative learning program (ALP) may lead to negative outcomes for students (e.g., lower academic achievement, attrition, involvement in the juvenile justice system; Anderson and Ritter in Educ Policy Anal Arch 25(49):1–33, 2017). School counselors are called to address inequitable policies, procedures, and conditions that may limit students’ personal/social and academic development, college access, and career readiness (ASCA, The ASCA national model: a framework for school counseling programs, 3rd edn. American School Counselor Association, Alexandria, VA, 2012). Additionally, school counselors should be unbiased in their decision-making (ASCA, Ethical standards for school counselors. American School Counselor Association, Alexandria, VA, 2016). The researchers utilized a true experimental design to examine the impact of student race (African American or White), gender (male or female), and socioeconomic status (SES; economically advantaged or disadvantaged) on practicing school counselors’ (N = 334) decisions to place students in ALPs for disciplinary reasons. A factorial analysis of variance revealed no statistically significant differences in school counselors’ likelihood of placing students in ALPs for disciplinary reasons based these student demographic factors. The study also revealed a statistically significant positive relationship between school counselors’ belief in a just world, as measured by the Global Belief in a Just World Scale (GBJWS; Lipkus in Personal Individ Differ, 12(11): 1171–1178. https://doi.org/10.1016/0191-8869(91)90081-L, 1991), and likelihood of referring students to ALPs for disciplinary reasons. Implications for school counselors and educational stakeholders are discussed.

Following more than a decade of influence by the Transforming School Counseling Initiative (Education Trust, 1998, 2007) that promoted a new vision of school counselors as assertive advocates and social activists (House & Hayes, 2002; House & Martin, 1998; Martin, 2002), professional school counselors are currently in a pivotal role to collaboratively lead school transformation at the local, state, regional, and national levels (Kaffenberger, Murphy, & Bemak, 2006). The importance of school counselors as leaders is evidenced in the ASCA National Model[R] (American School Counselor Association, 2005), wherein leadership is indicated as one of the four major themes of school counseling along with collaboration and teaming, advocacy, and systemic change. Beyond being leaders in the design, implementation, management, and evaluation of comprehensive school counseling programs, school counselors play a ubiquitous role in leading the education mission and process for the development of student academic, career, and personal/social growth. Further, as school systems become more diverse and complex, the resounding call for professional school counselors to be leaders of social justice and educational reform continues. Scholarly discourse on the role of the school counselor as an advocate and agent of social justice has been well documented (Baker & Gerler, 2004; Education Trust, 1998, 2007; Lee & Goodnough, 2007; Walker, 2006). Indeed, the preamble to ASCA's (2004) Ethical Standards for School Counselors explicates that school counselors are leaders and advocates who affirm diversity while promoting equitable access to educational resources, excellence in education, and postsecondary education for all students. Unfortunately, in spite of the focus to reform schools toward equity, the historical gaps between student groups have continued to persist (Roberts, 2004). As schools and communities continue to become more demographically diverse (Roberts), recognizing and challenging systemic oppression become key skills for school counselors in support of their advocacy for students and their efforts to remove social barriers that impede achievement (Bemak & Chung, 2005; Kiselica & Robinson, 2001; Ratts, DeKruyf, & Chen-Hayes, 2007). Preparing for the professional roles of change agent and promoter of social justice is crucial and involves a personal commitment to affirming diversity (Holcomb-McCoy & Chen-Hayes, 2007). Beyond this essential commitment, having the competencies to advocate is also critical. As editors and counselor educators, we believe that at the core of school counselor social justice practice is leadership. However, the related literature on school counselor leadership theory and practice has only recently begun to gain prominence. For example, Amatea and West-Olatunji (2007) explored the role of school counselors as leaders in high-poverty schools. In their article they illuminated the need for school counselors to collaborate with teachers and to assist school-based professionals in creating a climate of cultural acceptance while encouraging the success of all students. The focus of the article by Amatea and West-Olatunji was unique in that it underscored how school counselor leadership may positively impact access to community resources, educational outcomes, and systemic support of impoverished students. Following their lead, our intent as co-editors was to highlight, specifically, research and conceptual works dedicated to leadership in school counseling. In this special issue of Professional School Counseling, articles were selected that represent contributions to school counselor leadership theory and practice in order to stimulate further thought on the topic, as well as to motivate readers to conduct additional research on school counselor leadership. We further hope to encourage an ongoing professional dialogue about what are the salient characteristics of school counselor leadership and how counselor educators can teach and model leadership and advocacy skills in order to prepare professionals who are ready to actively participate in educational reform to benefit all students. …

Two major and mutually supportive paradigm shifts are impacting school counseling practice in the 21st century. The first shift, which is already well underway, emanates from within our discipline. The ASCA National Model® (American School Counselor Association, 2005) involves a movement away from providing discrete counseling services to a small proportion of K-12 students and toward providing outcomes-oriented, comprehensive, developmental counseling programs to impact the academic, career, and personal/social development of all students. Like the Comprehensive Developmental Guidance Program (Gysbers & Henderson, 2000) movement begun in the 1970s, it repositions the school counselor away from an ancillary role in helping a few students to an integral role in education. In addition to managing a comprehensive program that delivers a collaborative guidance curriculum, individual student planning, and responsive services to all students, the school counselor functions as an agent of systemic change who engages in leadership, advocacy, collaboration, and teaming with other professionals. Although some manifestations of the second shift are evident within the counseling field in general (Myers, Sweeney, & Witmer, 2000; Smith, 2006) and school counseling in particular (Amatea, Smith- Adcock, & Villares, 2006; Galassi & Akos, 2007), much of the impetus for this shift emanates from service and research areas outside our discipline, including developmental psychology (Lerner, 1986), positive psychology (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000), positive youth development (Benson, 1997), resiliency (Werner & Smith, 1992), social development (Catalano & Hawkins, 1996), and social work (Saleebey, 1997). The shift involves a movement away from a primary emphasis on pathology and deficits that impede development in a small percentage of students to a primary focus on personal strengths and environments that facilitate positive development for all students. Elsewhere (Galassi & Akos, 2007) we have referred to this newer emphasis as Strengths-Based School Counseling and stated that it is characterized by six major conceptual or organizing principles: * Promote cultural and context-based development for all students * Promote evidence-based individual student strengths * Promote evidence-based strengths-enhancing environments * Emphasize strengths promotion over problem reduction and problem prevention * Emphasize evidence-based interventions and practice * Emphasize promotion-oriented developmental advocacy at the school level. Not only are the two paradigm shifts compatible, but it is difficult to imagine school counselors impacting development for all students without operating from a strengths-based perspective. ASCA (2005) has clearly recognized that traditional deficitreduction emphases in school counseling reach only a small percentage of K-12 students. As such, the focus of this special issue is illustrating components of comprehensive school counseling programs in the 21st century being implemented from a strengthsbased perspective. The articles in this issue are organized into two complementary sections that should be familiar to the readers of Professional School Counseling. The first six articles are feature articles. Starting with Dennis Saleebey, who pioneered the application of a strengths-based perspective in social work, these articles are more conceptual in emphasis and focus primarily on more fully illustrating one or more of the strengths-based principles. …

Early adolescence is a period of intrapersonal and interpersonal transformation; thus, middle school counselors need to provide services that appropriately match their students’ and families’ developmental needs. A collaborative, systemic approach is one way that counselors can work with other school-based professionals to support parental/caregiver involvement. In this article, the authors discuss family disengagement in the middle school years and the middle school counselor as a collaborator of systemic change.

This project sheds light on the impact of bilingual and English immersion education in K–12 public schools at the middle school and high school levels. We focused on recently repealed English immersion programs that were implemented in the late 1990s across the United States. We examined the process of language acquisition among K–12 students in first-to third-generation immigrant and mixed-status families. We describe the impacts of language acquisition as students transitioned from high school to junior college and 4-year universities. We conducted surveys and in-depth interviews with individuals on the impacts of their English language instruction in K–12 and their experiences in higher education. The group of university students working on this project used our findings to create (a) an undergraduate research group focused on undocumented students and language acquisition and (b) an undergraduate student-led panel that developed a framework for visiting local high schools and middle schools enrolling high immigrant and majority minority student populations. The community outreach component allowed middle and high school students, teachers and counselors, and parents to hear about the continuing challenges and learn about strategies and resources for dealing with these issues. We offer advice for student involvement and organization on college campuses to facilitate the provision of resources for first-to third-generation students.

During the past decade, there has been an increasing gender achievement gap with male students lagging behind their female counterparts on a number of important indicators of school success. This article examines recommendations and strategies for school counselors working with middle school boys to enhance the learning environment, to promote strengths, and to encourage positive attitudes toward academic achievement and future planning. Collaboration with teachers, administrators, parents, and community members as important stakeholders can offer combined resources to promote school success. The strategies described have resulted from a local collaborative action research project conducted by counselor educators and students, the county supervisor of guidance, and middle school counselors.

Authors discuss the importance of school counselors addressing spiritual and religious issues in ethically meeting the developmental and cultural needs of K-12 students. Domains of spiritual and religious competence for professional counselors, published by the Association for Spiritual, Ethical, and Religious Values in Counseling (ASERVIC, 2009), are examined in relation to their relevance for professional school counselors. The authors introduce expert-reviewed Spiritual and Religious Competencies for School Counselors to supplement the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) School Counselor Competencies (ASCA, 2012). Implications for practice are presented along with strategies for integrating the competencies into a comprehensive school counseling program.

This presented research has three purposes: The first purpose of this study is to examine the power of middle school students' social emotional learning and daily life decision-making skills together as a predictor of their career development. The second purpose is to examine the career development of middle school students according to gender. Third purpose is to examine the career development of middle school students according to targeted high school type. The research group consisted of 263 middle school students (141 female, 116 male, 6 unknown). These students were studying in 3 middle schools in the center of a large city in the northwestern part of Turkey and their ages ranged between 10-15 (X̄=12.31; sd=1.07). The research data were collected by applying the Chilhood Career Development Scale, Social Emotional Learning Scale for Adolescents, Daily Life Decision Making Scale and Personal Information Form. The research data were analysed using multiple linear regression analysis, t test, and one-way ANOVA. The research results showed that middle school students' social emotional learning and daily life decision-making skills scores together accounted for a significant proportion of the variance 0.19% of the career development scores of middle school students. The results showed that the career development score mean of students targeted Anatolian high school were higher than those aiming for science high school and vocational and technical high school. There was not significantly differences in career development scores of the students according to gender. The research results were discussed based on the relevant literature, provided important implications for the theoretical and practical literature on career development, social emotional learning and daily life decision-making skills and suggestions were presented for future theoretical and practical research.

The focus of this study was to examine which attributes school counselors perceive as necessary for middle and high school students interested in a career in nursing. School counselors play a pivotal role in secondary students' career development but were found to have limited knowledge about the need for increased academic rigor in nursing. A national sample of 204 school counselors responded to a web-based survey that examined perceptions of necessary attributes of prospective nursing students. This is the first national study to identify school counselors' perceived attributes of prospective nursing students. Results included trustworthiness and caring; academic attributes ranked lower. School counselors in this study perceived nursing as a caring profession but not necessarily an academic one. Early intervention in middle school may alter preconceived images of nursing as exclusively female and caring but also as a profession that requires much academic preparation.

Chapter 8, “Understanding How to Manage Your School Counseling Program Using the ASCA National Model,” contains practical suggestions for organizing and administering school counseling tasks throughout the academic year. Considerations such as the school counselor’s office arrangement and space, assessments, and tools that facilitate these tasks such as management agreements, the advisory council, the use of data, action and lesson plans, and calendars are discussed to aid in your understanding of how the school counseling program can be best organized.

This chapter explores school counselors' role in accordance to the nation's indicated most extensive and comprehensive antibullying policy by the U.S. Department of Education (US DOE) as well as in alignment with the position of the American School Counselor Association (ASCA). The author introduces and evaluates bullying implications for underserved populations and research concerning the experiences of school counselors when serving students in the additional role designated by the model policy, antibullying specialist. This chapter identifies research driven suggestions for most effective practices counselor educators can train school counselors to advocate for when designing and implementing their comprehensive school counseling programs with prevention and intervention components.

A total of 204 middle and high school counselors from across the United States responded to a survey in which they were asked to determine whether they view specific adolescent risk-taking behaviors of varying intensity, frequency, and duration as warranting parental notification. Results suggest that counselors' perceptions that it is ethical to break confidentiality and report the risk-taking behaviors increased when the behaviors were more intense, more frequent, and of longer duration. Further, although there was less ambiguity regarding the perceived dangerousness of some behaviors (e.g., suicidal ideation), all behaviors showed some variance or disagreement among respondents with regard to their willingness to break confidentiality. Implications and suggestions for school counselors are considered.

This study examines the convergent validity and divergent validity of the Student Engagement in School Success Skills (SESSS) survey. The SESSS is easy to administer (it takes fewer than 15 minutes to complete) and is used in schools to provide educators with useful information about students' use of skills and strategies related to school success. A total of 4,342 fifth graders completed the SESSS; the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) Cognitive Strategy Use, Self-Regulation, Self-Efficacy and Test Anxiety subscales; and the Self-Efficacy for Self-Regulated Learning (SESRL). The three subscales of the SESSS (Self-Direction of Learning, Support of Classmates' Learning and Self-Regulation of Arousal) correlated highly with the MSLQ Cognitive Strategy Use and Self-Regulation subscales, moderately correlated with the Self-Efficacy subscale and the SESRL, and did not correlate with the MSLQ Test Anxiety subscale. Future research is needed to use the SESSS subscales as discriminable dimensions.Keywords: school success, convergent validity, divergent validity, Student Engagement in School Success Skills survey, educatorsFor more than a decade, researchers have placed increased emphasis on evidence-based practice and a programmatic approach to school counseling (Carey, 2004; Green & Keys, 2001; Gysbers, 2004; Lapan, 2005; Myrick, 2003; Paisley & Hayes, 2003; Whiston, 2002, 2011). This emphasis from the school counseling profession reflects national initiatives. In 2001, the Institute of Education Sciences, the research arm of the U.S. Department of Education, was established to determine, through rigorous and relevant research, what interventions are effective and ineffective for improving student achievement and education outcomes. The What Works Clearinghouse (WWC), an initiative of the Institute of Education Sciences, was created in 2002 to identify studies that provide credible and reliable evidence of the effectiveness of education interventions. The purpose of WWC is to inform researchers, educators and policymakers of interventions designed to improve student outcomes.The American School Counselor Association's (ASCA, 2005) response to emerging national policy and initiatives included a call for school counselor-led interventions that contribute to increased student achievement as part of a comprehensive school counseling program. The need for more research to identify evidence-based interventions tying school counselors to improved student academic performance also surfaced in a school counseling Delphi study, which identified the most pressing research questions in the profession (Dimmitt, Carey, McGannon, & Henningson, 2005). The top priority cited by this Delphi study was the need to determine which school counseling interventions resulted in the greatest student achievement gains. In addition, five major reviews of school counseling research all discussed the need for more research to strengthen the link between school counselor interventions and student achievement (Brown & Trusty, 2005; Dimmitt, Carey, & Hatch, 2007; Whiston & Quinby, 2009; Whiston & Sexton, 1998; Whiston, Tai, Rahardja, & Eder, 2011). However, researchers continue to report limitations in the school counseling outcome research. Among the limitations are conclusions drawn from studies based on nonstandardized outcome assessments. For instance, in a review of school counseling studies, Brown and Trusty (2005) concluded that school counseling research has been limited by the lack of valid and reliable instruments that measure the skills, strategies and personal attributes associated with academic and social/relationship success. More recently, Whiston et al. (2011) completed a meta-analytic examination of school counseling interventions and also determined the dominance of nonstandardized outcome assessments in school counseling research as a significant limitation. These limitations continue to be a hindrance for the school counseling profession, given the goal of establishing evidence-based practices that link school counselor interventions to improved student outcomes. …

School counseling programs must provide counselors-in-training with effective and multifaceted leadership skill-building opportunities (Brott, 2006; DeVoss & Andrews, 2006; Dollarhide, Gibson, & Saginak, 2008; Kaffenberger & Murphy, 2007). The Girls' Leadership Experience Camp (GLEC) was created by the authors to enhance the leadership abilities of local girls while providing a training ground for future school counselors to develop their own leadership abilities. The camp participants included 16 rising sixth-grade girls who were potential first-generation college students and were identified by school personnel as possible leaders. The training experiences were framed using the core qualities and components of the ASCA National Model® (American School Counselor Association, 2005). This article describes the processes and outcomes related to leadership training of future school counselors via the GLEC.