Preparing Counselors of Color: Addressing Differences in Counselor Education and Supervision Practice

As part of its series Innovations in Counseling: Working With Minority Populations, the NBCC Foundation invites you to a no-cost webinar Friday, April 24, 2015, from 1–2 p.m. Eastern time. Documentation of one clock hour of continuing education is available for registrants who attend the full webinar.

People of color make up a small percentage of both those receiving mental health and addiction services and of mental health practitioners (e.g., counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists and social workers). Due to the disparity among mental health practitioners of color and the patient population, education, training and supervision in cultural competence are imperative. As counselor educators who mainly educate and supervise counselors of color (COCs) and counseling students of color (CSOCs), the presenters have found that they have unique areas of cultural competence that need to be addressed. Several CSOCs report ill feelings, anger and even depression as it relates to experiences in which they have been discriminated against, oppressed and treated unfairly because of their race. Some report negative interracial relationships, experiences and media messages, which may result in mistrust, dislike, envy and even hatred of whites and other people of color. Some mental health professionals also face challenges in educating and supervising COCs and CSOCs due to their own level of cultural competence and lack of training in addressing these issues.

This webinar will provide knowledge, strategies and techniques that will assist counselors, supervisors and counselor educators who work with CSOCs as well as address potential barriers. Furthermore, this webinar will briefly outline the results of a review of multicultural textbooks used in counseling programs and their inclusion of content specifically targeted at developing the unique areas of cultural competence for CSOCs.

In this session, participants will:

• Learn about the unique areas of cultural competence that counselors of color (COCs) and counseling students of color (CSOCs) face.
• Become familiar with strategies and techniques that will be helpful in assisting COCs and CSOCs to navigate the challenges they might have in working with whites and/or other people of color.
• Learn about ways to address the barriers that COCs face when training and supervising.
• Be introduced to the research findings of the review of multicultural textbooks that may be helpful in preparing COCs and CSOCs with their development as culturally competent practitioners.

Here is the link to Register: http://www.nbccf.org/Webinars/UpcomingWebinars