Moving forward. Moving ahead. I was moved. It was a moving experience. Strangely, each of those phrases is apropos to something that will occur to your national headquarters staff next month. After a 30-year run at the office building we have called “home,” ACA will be relocating to a new
Category: Counseling Today
A small town celebrates a homecoming. Parties are given in honor of the combat veteran who has returned home triumphantly. Families and loved ones are reunited, and community leaders show honor to the warrior by offering laud in public ceremonies. All appears to be whole again. But as the dust settles and
When addressing race-based topics in counselor trainings, have you noticed times when learners’ emotional reactions inhibited their abilities to absorb training material or your ability to instruct? If the answer is yes, know that you are not alone. Race-based trainings are not for the faint of heart — at least
Picture a female client facing a bleak employment market, stressing out about finding a new living space and struggling to find a boyfriend who wants the same things she does. She also suffers from low self-esteem and has been dabbling in some disordered eating. Based on that description, perhaps you
The final vignette of this series reflects an actual situation that occurred in my diversity workshop. I am including my thoughts/rationale and the intervention I used during the situation, as well as questions for other group facilitators to consider, possible group/dyad exercises and a summary that helps to place the
When Russian author Leo Tolstoy wrote in his novel Anna Karenina, “Each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way,” he was definitely on to something. A dysfunctional family environment has myriad effects on its members — effects that are intricately woven by factors such as personalities, communication abilities, attachment
The American Counseling Association recently released its 2014 counselor compensation survey, the organization’s first large-scale effort to determine the salary levels, health care and other benefits earned by those in the counseling profession. The project determined that the average primary salary for counselor educators is $66,405 annually. Rehabilitation counselors make
If you provide counseling services to clients who have autism, or any of several other mental health conditions, at some point you will inevitably work with them on social skills. And if you are like many of the practitioners I know, you have a sizeable collection of the various resources
Thanks in part to the advocacy efforts of the American Counseling Association, mental health services are among the major elements included in a resolution that will inform and influence the United Nations’ strategic plan for 2015-2030. ACA has been designated an official U.N. nongovernmental organization (NGO) for nearly a decade.
Jamie P. Merisotis is president and CEO of Lumina Foundation, the nation’s largest private foundation committed solely to enrolling and graduating more students from college. In celebration of the opening of the 2014-2015 academic year, Frank Burtnett, editor of ACAeNews for School Counselors, asked Merisotis to present an overview of