Objectives:
1. Describe how an ethical counselor addresses issues of professional competence in his or her own practice.
2. Compare the ethical issues involved in the counselor-client relationship to those involved in the supervisor-counselor relationship.
3. Describe a decision-making process that an ethical counselor can use to respond to issues of incompetence and/or other unethical conduct by fellow counselors.
4. Discuss the different roles of a counselor, supervisor, and consultant within the counseling field. [CACREP 2.F.1.m]
5. Analyze the role of counseling supervision in the profession. [CACREP 2.F.1.m]
Topic 7 DQ 1 (Obj. 7.5)
Assessment Description
You are counseling in an agency or school setting in which your supervision consists of weekly group staff meetings. At these meetings, agency policies, procedures, and other administrative issues are discussed. You are uneasy with this situation because you believe that true clinical supervision would help you improve your counseling skills and your current work with clients. You are also aware that you need a minimum number of documented hours of clinical supervision in order to obtain your independent counseling license, and you wonder if your supervisor’s brief notes about “staffing cases” as the activity in these staff meetings are sufficient documentation. Discuss the ethical issues involved in this situation, describe your options for how to proceed, and identify the option(s) you would choose. Explain your reasoning.
In your response, you must include the specific code(s) from the ACA Code of Ethics or the ASCA Ethical Standards for School Counselors that address the concerns raised in the case. Be sure to provide the full text of the code followed by an in-text citation and a full reference at the end of your response.
To strengthen your response, you may also include citations and references from the Corey text or other assigned readings relevant to the topic.
This discussion question is informed by the following CACREP Standard:
2.F.1.m. The role of counseling supervision in the profession.