TPC-Journal-V4-Issue4

The Professional Counselor \Volume 4, Issue 4 289 Expertise in this area was evidenced by 20 or more refereed publications about the career development of marginalized populations, as well as a clearly demonstrated commitment to improving the lived experiences of such populations (i.e., scholarship that is intended to improve community/client career development and work contexts). For example, one of the experts targeted for this study conducted studies about marginalized K–12 students’ career development, the process and results of which have direct benefits for this population. The authors chose a minimum of 20 publications for inclusion of participants in order to set a high bar for the experts, while also allowing for the inclusion of relatively new scholars in the career development field. Initial criteria were set very high because the next step in the recruitment process involved asking these experts to nominate other scholars and practitioners who also are experts in the target area. The authors used this nomination process based on the notion that such experts would be qualified to nominate other experts in their field (Fish & Busby, 1996; Linstone & Turoff, 1975; Skulmoski et al., 2007; Vázquez-Ramos et al., 2007). The authors identified four individuals who met the two inclusion criteria, and two of them agreed to participate in the nomination and data collection process. These two experts had a significant number of refereed publications (35; 54) that addressed the career development of traditionally marginalized populations. These experts consequently nominated 22 individuals, and 12 of those individuals who were identified agreed to participate in and completed this study. Because the Delphi method relies heavily on expert opinion, the authors collected detailed descriptions of the experts’ backgrounds (the experts themselves provided the ensuing terminology for gender, race/ethnicity and professional identity). Experts had a mean of 23.17 and a median of 24 years of experience in the field of career development, with a range of 4–45 years. Experts’ racial/ethnic identification included two as African American, one as Hispanic, one as White/Polish American and eight as White/Caucasian. Ten identified as female/woman and two as male. Seven experts identified themselves as scholars, and five identified as practitioners. These experts’ research and/or service provision was focused on a broad range of populations and backgrounds including diversity in race, ethnicity, nationality, gender identity, sexual orientation, class, educational background, age and ability status. In terms of geographic regions, one individual worked in the South, two worked in the West, two worked in the Midwest, and seven worked in the Northeast. Two experts worked primarily in a suburban context, two worked in a rural/suburban context and eight worked in an urban context. Data Collection and Analysis As outlined by Fish & Busby’s (1996) use of the Delphi method, this study involved three rounds of data collection and analysis. Round one . The first round of this study was designed to capture qualitative data that reflected expert opinions. This data was collected electronically via an online survey platform. In order to create a refined data collection process, an initial survey was piloted with three individuals (a counselor educator with expertise in the career development of marginalized populations, a counselor education doctoral student who worked extensively with first-generation college students, and a counseling psychologist with expertise in the Delphi method and qualitative research). These questions were as follows: 1. What are the most significant career development and work issues experienced by traditionally marginalized populations as a result of the current economic climate? 2. What can career counselors and the career development profession do to effectively address these challenges? The authors considered the data collected via this pilot survey and interviewed the three individuals about their experience taking the survey. Based on the feedback and responses from the pilot study, question 1 above was split into two questions, as the original question did not yield a clear differentiation between general career