Career Guidance and
Student Counseling
By: Dr. Radhika Kapur (A Research
Paper)
Published By:
WWW.GovtJobsPortal.IN
Abstract:
Career guidance and student counseling is
an extremely broad and a comprehensive concept, in order to implement this task
effectively there are number of factors that need to be taken under
consideration. The guidance regarding ones career and the counseling of
students involves a conversation between a career counselor; who should be
an expert in his field, he should possess all the skills, abilities, knowledge
and information regarding the job openings, prospects, opportunities that are
available and possess the ability to effectively communicate with the person
who is seeking counseling and guidance.
On
the other hand, the students or job seekers or a person who is already
engaged in employment and is willing to make a transformation is required to
posses effective communication skills,
a pleasant personality, an approachable nature, an amiable attitude, should be well qualified and possess the
required skills and abilities to work and get engaged into an employment
setting.
Understanding the
Significance of Career Guidance and Student Counseling
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) elucidates that the career counseling of youth comprises of four main components:
(a) providing assistance to
the individuals to acquire greater self-awareness in areas such as interests,
values, abilities, and personality style,
(b) linking individuals to
sources so that they can become more well-informed about occupations and
professions,
(c) involving human beings
in the decision-making process so that they can choose a career path that is
well suited to their own interests, values, abilities, requirements and personality
style, and
(d) supporting individuals
to be dynamic administrators of their career paths including management of
career transitions and balancing various life roles as well as becoming
lifelong learners in the sense of professional development over the lifetime
(Career Development, n.d.).
There have been individuals who choose
career counseling as a profession and provide guidance and assistance to
individuals who need counseling regarding the selection of subjects or
programs. When individuals graduate from high school; they are at times
confused between two or more fields or subjects, when they have the required
percentage and both engineering as well as medical college offers them
admission, then they seek career counseling whether they should choose to
become an engineer or a medical doctor. Career counseling and guidance is
provided to an individual on the basis of ones interests, abilities,
requirements, values and personality traits.
It
is vital for an individual to learn how to manage ones career management
skills; as it has been stated that career is a lifelong objective, a career
should never come to a halt and an individual should develop the skills
regarding the management of his career. For example, an individual is an
educator and has chosen the teaching career, therefore, the management of the
teaching career centers upon enhancement of the skills such as having efficient
knowledge of the subject that he is teaching, good communication skills,
appropriate behavioral traits, proper training strategies, regular attendance
and efficient formulation of curriculum and instructional methodologies. In any
kind of profession, job or field, it is essential to develop career management
skills, hence the areas that should be taken into account are: (Career
Development Guide, n.d.).
1.
One should realize that
career management is extremely crucial for ones successful living, and should
become a possessor of ones career development.
2.
Identification of ones
career goals and objectives is essential; what one wants to achieve and what
are the possible passageways that would lead to the achievement of the desired
career goals and objectives.
3.
Identification of all the
areas that would lead to ones professional development is also regarded to be a
vital career management skill; ones professional development and ones career
management goes simultaneously.
4.
One should formulate a
career development plan; in the plan all the areas, requirements, capabilities
and interests should be stated that the individual finds best.
5.
One should become aware
and knowledgeable regarding how to carry out, contribute and get involved in
successful career conversations.
The Consequence of Career Guidance and Student Counseling
Career counseling has transformed considerably since its
beginning while preserving most of its essential constituents. This was at
first instigated to assist the youth in the process of identifying the work and
the kinds of jobs for which they were suited. As the value of this undertaking
became widely recognized, vocational guidance units were added to school
curriculum and became an essential part of the educational institutions.
Vocational guidance served both those who are work bound and those who are
college bound, in other words, both the people benefit from this undertaking,
those who are working as well as those who are pursuing their higher education.
Although, in fact the two groups often received extremely different types of
training, and differences between the two groups have yet to be addressed
adequately in the field of career guidance and student counseling (Capuzzi
& Stauffer, 2012).
The main consequence of the guidance of
students in the field of education is that, adequate and professional
counseling and guidance of students not just involves communicating to them
about the jobs and work opportunities available in accordance to their skills
and abilities but it also involves communicating to the students regarding the
labor market factors, main aspects of appropriate decision making and even
different kinds of unpaid work available, because, people normally do get
involved in volunteer jobs which are without pay in order to acquire work experience,
because normally all kinds of jobs require either short term or long term work
experience. Adequate counseling and guidance of students takes place in all
kinds of educational institutions, even in kindergarten schools, counseling and
guidance of young students is considered to be a crucial aspect.
Purposes of Student Counseling
and Guidance
There
have been many purposes of counseling and guidance in all aspects, but in this
case, the significant purpose has been identified from the perspective of education
and the purposes have been stated as follows:
1.
The individuals have to
be made aware of their basic personal prerequisites, abilities, assets,
liabilities and potentialities; hence they have to be made aware about their
own positive points and negative points.
2.
Effective, meaningful and
significant information has to be provided to them in solution of their
problems.
3.
The students should learn
how to scrutinize their weaknesses and then overcoming them; the role of the
counselor and a guide is to help them how to catch the fish on their own and
not catching fish by themselves and giving it to them.
4.
Students may also need
counseling and guidance services regarding the selection of a career; in this
case, they should assist them in making appropriate, satisfying and interesting
educational choices.
5.
The teachers as well as
the parents should also meet with the counselor or the guide, because it is
crucial for them to effectively assist the student who is undergoing counseling
and guidance sessions. The parents and the teachers should understand the needs
and problems of the students and harsh behavior or screaming at the student is
strictly prohibited.
6.
The school authorities or
the administrators should be assisted in improving the educational objectives,
planning and course curriculum.
7.
The school environment
should be formed in such a manner that students should feel safe and sound,
they should develop proper attitude towards school, teachers, classmates,
values, norms, policies, interests, beliefs, discipline and rules.
8.
Students should be guided
to identify their flaws and inconsistencies in the field of education and
improve upon their learning. They should be guided in a manner to promote
effectiveness.
9.
Students who get addicted
to underage drinking and usage of drugs should be shown the right direction and
prescribe ways to get rid of such things because they are the major hindrances
to ones personal and professional development.
10. It
is essential to promote amongst the students a sense of awareness, ability to
acquire sufficient knowledge regarding their studies, when studying they should
put the complete focus, and become more capable and intelligent.
Characteristics of Career Counseling
The
following are the characteristics of career counseling: (Soumeli, 2012).
1.
Counseling
is part of an extensive sector of applied psychology, which has been extended in
the structures of career counseling as well as of guidance and sustenance of
the individuals during their attempt to practice a career according to their skills
and capabilities, or their endeavor to decide upon the psychological problems correlated
with their educational and professional life.
2.
Education
and career decision making is vital for every individual. Especially, in the
present existence, in an era, distinguished primarily by the quick transformation
and internationalization of labor, determining and managing a career becomes difficult
and it is often aggravating. The person is needed to hold upon the knowledge, be
familiar with the objectives, values, requirements and functions that are involved.
With the new data and information available, one is discussing about a new
model for Professional Development which is the model of Personal Career
Management. As far this model is concerned, the individual is required to have the
opportunity to reassess the connection between the obtained educational
qualifications, the jobs and the personal skills and abilities that he
possesses, to be organized through a lifelong learning process in order to be forwarded
effectively along with the speedy transformations taking place in the labor
market.
3.
Accordingly,
the professional selection is not a single final decision but it is the outcome
of a complete sequence of progressive conclusions, a procedure by which a
person finds every time, that is vital in his life and recognition of his or her
main priorities.
4.
Through
the development of the above model, one approaches the contemporary and practical
measurement of the individual career as a measured, continuing and a
complicated process that involves the counseling, the psychological and
educational measurement and last but not the least; it also requires the active
participation of the students, job seekers and graduates. The model of Personal
Career Management is advanced as a regular and multifaceted process that
involves the counseling, the psychological and educational measurement and
similarly also requires the active participation of the students, job seekers
and graduates. The student has already made a preliminary educational selection.
After that, he has to make a professional selection which can either be additional
education professional training or organization of seminars, workshops, obtaining
a master degree, doctorate and so forth.
Influential Factors in Career Guidance and
Student Counseling
There have been four categories of factors that
influence career guidance and student counseling: (Report on Effective Career
Guidance, 2002).
1. Genetic Endowment and Special Abilities- Race,
gender, physical appearance and characteristics; individuals vary both in their
capability to benefit from learning experiences and to acquire access to various
kinds of learning experiences because of these types of inherited qualities.
2. Environmental Conditions and Events- Social,
cultural, political, economic and natural forces and natural resources; these
are normally external to the control of any one individual; their influence can
be prepared or unprepared.
3. Learning Experiences- Each individual has a
unique history of learning experiences that result in their selection of different
career opportunities. They often don’t retain the information of the precise nature
or series of these learning experiences, but rather they keep in mind the wide-ranging
conclusions from them for example, one possesses the ability to work under stress
and working with young children. The two main types of learning experiences
identified in the theory are an instrumental learning experience which consists
of preceding conditions and incentives, behavioral responses that are explicit and
concealed, consequences and associative learning experiences where individuals recognize
the relationship between two or more sets of stimuli in the environment for
example, observation, reading or hearing about occupations; these can result in
occupational stereotypes.
4. Task Approach Skills- Communications among
learning experiences, genetic illustrations, and environmental influences result
in the development of task approach skills. These include personal standards of
presentation, work habits and emotional reactions. In the past, the trained
task approach skills that are functional to a new task or problem both affect the
effect of that task or problem and make themselves adapted and transformed.
Bibliography
Capuzzi, D., &
Stauffer, M.D. (2012). Career Counseling Foundations, Perspectives and
Applications. Retrieved September
12, 2016 from
Career Development: Basic Concepts and Applications. (n.d.).
Retrieved September 12, 2016 from
Career Development Guide for HR Practitioners at ANU. (n.d.).
Retrieved September 12, 2016 from
Handbook on career counseling. A practical manual for developing,
implementing and assessing career counseling services in
higher education
settings. (2002). Retrieved September 11, 2016 from
Ojo, O.D., Rotimi,
O. (2006). Fundamentals of Counseling and Guidance. Retrieved September 20,
2014 from
Report
on Effective Career Guidance. (2008). Retrieved
September 11, 2016 from http://www.career- guide.eu/uploads/cg_handbook_low.pdf
Soumeli, L.K.
(2012). Career Counseling in Secondary Education: a comparative approach of
guidance services between
Greece and France. Retrieved September 11, 2016 from https://cica.org.au/wp-content/uploads/Career_counselling_secondary_education.pdf
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