The work of Jesse Davis, Anna Reed, Eli Weaver, Frank Parsons, and a host of other pioneers created the momentum for the development of a school counseling profession. Coincidentally, many of these developments, with their roots founded in the vocational guidance movement, raised questions about the profession’s narrow focus on vocational development. Eventually, some leaders of the counseling movement began to encourage a broader focus that included issues of personality and human development beyond vocational guidance. This broader view laid the groundwork for many of the counseling theories and approaches that were created in the years that followed.
Before World War II
After the vocational guidance movement of the early1900s, World War I was the next major event that had an impact on the developing counseling profession. During the First World War, the United States military began using group-training procedures to screen and classify draftees. Intelligence testing developed in the beginning of the decade, was the catalyst for his movement. In particular, work begun by French psychologist Alfred Binet, and later expanded by Lewis Terman and Arthur Otis, was adapted by the military. Arthur Otis developed an intelligence test that could be given to large groups and administered by unskilled examiners. Nevertheless, the military’s interest in using group measurement techniques was embraced by schools and the education profession when the war ended. The potential for applying testing and other measurement techniques to pupil assessment helped catapult the development and expansion of standardized testing in United States schools. The 1920s also saw the rise of progressive education in the schools.
This movement, introduced by John Dewey, emphasized the school’s role in guiding students in their personal, social, and moral development (Nugent2000). As a result schools began in co- operating guidance activities in to the curriculum for the purpose of developing skills for living (Brewer, 1932). This movement was short-lived and was criticized by parents, teachers and others for been too permissive and anti-educational. These critics wanted to focus on fundamentals of education and claimed that moral development was in the purview of the home and the church. This criticism in addition to declining public funds brought on by the Great Depression, all but cost the abandonment of support for guidance activities and counseling services in the schools.
The late1930s saw the first theory of guidance and counseling called Trait and Factor theory, developed by Williamson at the University of Minnesota. Using Parson’s vocational program as a spring board, Williamson and his colleagues became reading advocates for what became known as the directive or counselor centered approach to school counseling. In this book “How to Counsel Students” Williamson (1939) note that counselors should state their point of view with definiteness
attempting through exposition to enlighten the student. In this direct approach counselors were expected to dispense the information and gather data to influence and motivate student. Later Williamson softened this view to some degree. In 1958 he wrote that the counselor is responsible for helping the student become more sophisticated, more matured in understanding the value option that he faces and to identify clearly those that he refers. At the same time the directive approach maintained that counselors could not give complete freedom of choice to students who were not capable of making the best decisions for themselves. According to this view counselors were obliged to protect the interest of society, the school as an institution, and the student. Williamson believed that the development of individuality on the part of student must be balanced with concern for self destructive and anti-social behaviors.
World War II to the Space Age
The 1940s saw major changes in the counseling profession, and these developments had significant impact on the practice of counseling in schools. Among the influences during this period, three major events seem to have shaped these developments:
(1) The popularity of the client-centered to counseling developed by Carl Rogers
(2) The onset and impact of World War II on U.S. society
(3) Government involvement in the counseling and education professions after the war. In addition, organizational changes within the profession and emerging theoretical models of counseling were significant and direction of the counseling profession.
The Rogerian influence. Roger’s gave new direction to the profession by focusing on the helping relationships established between counselors and their clients and by recognizing the importance of personal development in these relationships. This focus moved the profession away from the counselor-centered perspectives of earlier items and emphasized a growth oriented counseling relationship as opposed to an informational and problem solving one.
Opinions about Roger’s influence on the school counseling profession are not uniformly favorable. Wittmer (2000b) noted that inordinate attention placed on the individual by the client-centered approach ‘’somehow took us off-tracking school counselor preparation and may have contributed to the inappropriate training of many school counselors’’. In particular, the emphasis on individual counseling processes tended to neglect preventive and developmental interventions needed in school environments. Nevertheless, the impact of Roger’s work on counseling practices both in and out of schools was remarkable.
World War II and Government Influence
Two other events that influenced the counseling profession during this period were World War II and increased government involvement in the counseling and psychology professions. As the United States entered the war, the government requested assistance from counselors and psychologists to help in screening, selecting and training military and industrial specialists. After the war, the Veterans Administration (VA) provided funds for graduate students to become trained as counselors and psychologists. About this time, the term counseling psychologist emerged in VA specifications, further distinguishing psychology from vocational guidance (Gladding, 2000).Another example of governmental influence in the counseling profession was the George-Barden Act of 1946.
This legislation provided funds to develop and support guidance and counseling activities in schools and other settings. For the first time in history, school counselors and state and local supervisors received resource, leadership, and financial support from the government. This action fueled the start of a period of rapid growth for guidance and counseling services in schools. One governmental change that occurred in the 1950s was the re organization of the Guidance and Professional Branch of the U.S. Office of Education (Gysbers and Henderson, 2000). In 1955, a Guidance and Personnel Services Section was reestablished. The development of this office helped to move the school counseling profession further away from its original vocational emphasis to a broader student services perspective. This trend continued through the 1950s and into the 1 960s. the ensuing public outcry and criticism of educational institutions eventually led to the passage of Public Law 85-864, entitled the National Defense Education Act of 1958 (NDEA).
francis1897 answered the question on March 15, 2023 at 13:03