TPC-Journal-V4-Issue5

The Professional Counselor \Volume 4, Issue 5 523 Procedure Five teachers at the two high schools assisted with data collection. Since research participation and the protocol were new to most of the teachers, explanation of the confidential and voluntary nature of the project was provided through teleconference. Questions from the teachers were answered via e-mail. One of the teachers in Beijing was in charge of the informed consent forms and data storage. Parents of the students in the classrooms of all five teachers received one copy of the informed consent and all granted consent for their child to participate in the research. Students then received e-mails. An online survey tool (http://www.surveymonkey. com ) was used to administer the questionnaire. Results The first goal of this study was to examine how many students had sought services from school counselors and the number of meetings they had had with their school counselors since they entered high school. Descriptive statistics were obtained in order to achieve this goal. Nearly half of the participants (48.9%, n = 67) reported having seen counselors at least once. Among these 67 students, the majority ( n = 41) had met once individually with a school counselor, 22 had seen a school counselor individually two to three times, and four students had talked with school counselors four to five times. No student reported having met with a school counselor more than five times. Information on the length of these individual counseling sessions was not obtained in the survey. The second goal of this study was to examine the students’ perceptions of their school counselors. Fifty-three students provided a complete evaluation of their school counselors in the survey. Among these 53 students, 36 had used counseling services before, whereas 17 reported no individual meetings with a counselor. As shown in Table 1, students’ most positive ratings of their school counselors were for friendliness and approachability ( M = 3.20, SD = 1.25) and ability to explain things clearly ( M = 2.99, SD = 1.33). The lowest rated attributes were knowledge of college admission ( M = 1.30, SD = 1.42) and knowledge of vocational information ( M = 1.10, SD = 1.30). Table 1 Descriptive Statistics on Students’ Evaluations of School Counseling Services School counseling services evaluated N Min Max M SD Friendliness and approachability 137 0 4 3.20 1.25 Ability to explain things clearly 137 0 4 2.99 1.33 Availability to students 137 0 4 2.77 1.38 Understanding students’ points of view 138 0 4 2.73 1.32 Promptness in responding to requests 137 0 4 2.68 1.47 Reliability to keep promises 137 0 4 2.37 1.62 Advocate for students 137 0 4 2.31 1.51 Knowledge of achievement tests 137 0 4 1.82 1.44 Knowledge of college admission 141 0 4 1.30 1.42 Knowledge of vocational information 138 0 4 1.10 1.30 Overall effectiveness 137 0 4 2.51 1.40 Valid N (listwise) 137