Case Study

"BEFORE COMMMITTING.....PLEASE READ EVERYTHING!!!!"

CAREER COUNSELING CASE STUDY (worth 60 points or 21% of the final grade)

This activity will develop practical experience in applying a career development mode, explore a variety of career-counseling activities and resources, review and interpret assessment tools, and organize career counseling information into a career counseling plan. Each student will be assigned a case study to review and analyze. After reviewing and analyzing the assigned case study, students are to develop a career counseling plan by using one of the career development models. Exploration of career counseling assessments, career counseling resources, occupational information, and other relevant information will be required. Students will write an eight page report that summarizes and analyzes the process of all activities and information.

Guidelines for Case Study Analysis:

1.       What career counseling model seems to parallel your case study client? Discuss how they correspond.

2.       Describe the need for a referral or additional services beyond the career development setting.

3.       Discuss the selected career development assessments, resources, and activities that appear relevant for the case study client. What appears to be some of the advantages and disadvantages of the selected career tools?

4.       Discuss your experience as a counselor with the case study. Describe your thoughts and feelings. What was difficult, frustrating, satisfying and rewarding? If you could start over with this case study assignment, what would you do differently? What did you learn about yourself and career counseling from participating in this assignment?

Written Case Analysis Guidelines:

Each assignment should be at least eight (8) pages in body length. This does not include the title page and reference page. American Psychological Association (APA) writing style and formatting (Cover page, Reference Page, and correct use of double-spacing throughout the paper, including appropriate paragraph indentation) should be used. No late assignment will be accepted. The following guidelines will be used to rate the case study assignment:

Career Counseling Case Analysis Rating Scale

Analysis                                                                      Possible Points            Points

1. Clear, analytical application of a career

    development model.                                                           10                               

2. Specific, clear and detailed discussion of

    assessments, future plans, and a need

    for additional services.                                                        10

3. Case included a wide range of

   assessment tools and appropriate

   internet and/or occupational resources.                               10

4. Insightful and analytical discussion of

   the advantages/disadvantages of the

   selected resources and career tools.                                     10                   

5. Insightful, clear and thorough

    discussion of your experience as

    counselor and what you learned

    from this case study assignment.                                        10                                           

                        SUBTOTAL………………..                         50

 Overall thoroughness, clarity, and

 comprehensiveness of the project……….                             10

                        FINAL TOTAL……………..                        60

USING THIS MODEL.......

Model II Development Model

This developmental model has been built from the position that career development is a lifelong process and the career development needs of unique individuals must be met during all stages of life (Healy, 1982; Gelso & Fretz, 2001; Swanson & Fouad, 2010; Sharf, 2013). Goals, learning strategies, and timing of interventions in this model are guided by what was labeled as Super’s (1957, 1990) vocational developmental tasks and stages. Counselors are to focus on all barriers that may diminish one’s development of career maturity and self-concept. Ideally, clients should focus on the development of all life roles for a balanced lifestyle; an individual’s unique needs are emphasized. As you learned from chapter 2, Super’s career development theory is very extensive and inclusive. The following summary statements include some major counseling concerns that can serve as a connection between theory and practice:

• • Career development is a lifelong process; individuals change during developmental stages as they adapt to changing life roles.
• • There are five life stages—growth, exploration, establishment, maintenance, and disengagement. Each stage has a series of developmental tasks.
• • Readiness (career maturity) is essential for optimal career decision making.
• • Counselors focus on developmental tasks as key points for appropriate interventions.
• • Unique individual needs are most important as guidelines for establishing counseling goals.
• • Clients must be prepared to project self into the work world; a realistic self-concept is essential.
• • The importance of adult concerns is highlighted; what happens in one life role affects other life roles.
• • Clients are to not to restrict career alternatives; self-knowledge and exposure to compatible alternative career paths are essential.

The following counseling model includes five stages as follows:

• 1. Intake Interview
  • a. Establish client individuality.
  • b. Uncover barriers to career choice.
  • c. Evaluate affective concerns such as poor self-concept and self-awareness.
  • d. Establish level of occupational knowledge.
  • e. Identify work experiences.
• 2. Career Development Assessment and Counseling (CDAC)
  • a. Life structure and work salience.
  • b. Career development status and resources.
  • c. Abilities, interests, and values.
  • d. Occupational self-concept and life themes.
• 3. Data Integration and Narrative Interpretation
  • a. Explanation of accumulated data.
• 4. Establish Counseling Goals
  • a. Develop an accurate portrait of self.
  • b. Project self-concept into work world.
• 5. Counseling Procedures and Process
  • a. Emphasize career development tasks.
  • b. Counseling process includes coaching and mentoring and, if necessary, recycling previous steps.

In the first stage of this model, as in most of the other models. The counseling relationship between counselor and client is of the utmost importance. The counselor makes tentative appraisals of the client that are to be verified or debunked during the assessment phases and discussions that follow. A good example is the tentative conclusion that a client is of average intelligence or more specifically able to learn more about occupations and self-concept through learning programs. The verification and specification of this tentative conclusion will be determined by ability tests and further discussions. The counselor employs interview skills that encourage clients to verbalize their past experiences as well as future goals and lifestyle issues.

The second stage of this model, known as career development assessment and counseling (CDAC), is very extensive and inclusive. There are four very important steps in this stage and each will be explained separately. During the first step in this stage, the client’s social development and role salience are assessed. The emphasis of assessment is on the client’s relative importance of life roles that involve education, work, family, community, and leisure.

The second step consists of an evaluation of the client’s perception of the work role, such as his or her current career status, as well as career concerns that are associated with growth, exploration, establishment, maintenance, and disengagement. In addition assessment includes measures of the client’s knowledge and attitudes about career choice, especially when one is involved in career planning and career exploration and gathering information about work and occupations. The client’s adaptability (making mature career decisions) and perception of current job market trends are also of utmost importance.

The third step includes the often used measures of abilities, interests, and values. A variety of instruments that measure these characteristics are available as described in chapter 6. In the developmental model, interest inventories that present results as estimates of realistic, investigative, artistic, social, enterprising, and conventional (RIASEC) types are preferred. Thus counselors would use the very popular and effective Holland (1992) typology as described in chapter 2. The overarching goal here is to present the client with valuable information concerning the relationship and connection of her or his abilities, interest, and values in the choice process.

The fourth and final step focuses on self-concepts and life themes. The procedures in this step are often referred to as subjective evaluations of the client’s view of self and dominant lifestyles and life themes expressed by clients in conversations or in an autobiography. Counselors guide and encourage clients to discuss their work and other life-role experiences, including how one has made decisions in the past and negotiated transitions. Another method is to ask clients to write about their life experiences and future projections. Salience of life-role indicators includes, the amount and quality of participation in different roles, the commitment one makes to life roles, and the opportunities provided by life roles for meeting numerous value needs. This concludes the assessment steps in stage two of this counseling model.

The third stage in this model is primarily devoted to an explanation and interpretation of the key measurement instruments and the counselor’s subjective information that was garnered from the interview and other discussions of life roles. Counselors often use profiles of score reports as a visual aid when discussing the significance of client scores. One advantage of using test data to get to know your client better is through score reports that usually encourage clients to self-assess and express agreement and disagreement with scores. Counselors have the opportunity to encourage clients to draw conclusions about their future from score results.

In this model’s fourth stage, counselor and client in a working consensus relationship are to establish future counseling goals. Counselors are to assist clients in conceptualizing an accurate self-concept. According to Super (Super, Starishesky, & Matlin, Jordan, 1963), self-concept development includes one’s ability to self-differentiate, role play, explore, and test reality. Over time other explanations of how self-concepts are developed and expressed have been suggested. In some of the following chapters I will discuss the importance and relationships of self-efficacy and self-concept. In the developmental model, self-concept is a most important factor in the choice process—one is to project one’s self-concept into the work world to find an optimal fit.

The fifth and final stage of this model emphasizes that counselors should include a careful analysis of the client’s progress in career development and maintenance of career. Counselors are encouraged to challenge clients to be aware of developmental tasks such as those for early adulthood: Strive to make your work position secure and a permanent position, but also find more opportunities for your work of choice. Such tasks are especially relevant when the economy is in recession and job loss does indeed happen. What is also suggested here is that workers may have to make multiple career choices over time.