School counselor

A school counselor is a and an educator who works in elementary, middle, and/or high schools to provide academic, career, college readiness, and personal/social competencies to all K-12 students through a school counseling program.

The four main school counseling program interventions used include: school counseling core curriculum classroom lessons and annual academic, career/college readiness, and personal/social planning for every student; and group and individual counseling for some students. School counseling is an integral part of the education system in large numbers of countries and in others it is emerging as a critical support for elementary, middle, and high school learning and/or student health concerns.

An outdated term for the profession was guidance counselor; school counselor is preferred due to school counselors' role in advocating for every child's academic, career, college readiness, and personal/social success in every elementary, middle, and high school. In the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Pacific, some countries with no formal school counseling programs use teachers or psychologists to do school counseling with a primary emphasis on career development.

Countries vary in how a school counseling program and services are provided based on economics (funding for schools and school counseling programs), social capital (independent versus public schools), and school counselor certification and credentialing movements in education departments, professional associations, and national and local legislation. In 2013, school counseling is established in 62 countries and emerging in another seven.

An international scoping project on school-based counseling showed school counseling is mandatory in 39 countries, 32 USA states, one Australian state, 3 German states, 2 countries in the United Kingdom, and three provinces in Canada. The largest accreditation body for Counselor Education/School Counseling programs is the Council for the Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP). International Counselor Education programs are accredited through a CACREP affiliate, the International Registry of Counselor Education Programs (IRCEP).

In some countries, school counseling is provided by school counseling specialists (for example, Botswana, China, Finland, Israel, Malta, Nigeria, Romania, Taiwan, Turkey, United States). In other cases, school counseling is provided by classroom teachers who either have such duties added to their typical teaching load or teach only a limited load that also includes school counseling activities (for example- India, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Zambia). The IAEVG focuses primarily on career development with some international school counseling articles and conference presentations.

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