TPC-Journal-V5-Issue1

The Professional Counselor /Volume 5, Issue 1 154 are both considered highly important to professional development in models of supervision (Bernard, 1997; Holloway, 1995; Loganbill, Hardy, & Delworth, 1982; R ø nnestad & Skovholt, 2003; Stoltenberg, McNeill, & Delworth, 1998), as well as to personal development. Such research led the present authors to ask how counselor training programs can best assist in professional and personal identity development using transformational tasks. One suggestion is to incorporate transformational learning experiences into counselor training course work. In the current study, the authors examined the effects of transformational learning exercises on counselor professional identity development, using the professional identity development model (Gibson et al., 2010). In addition, the authors examined how the integration of transformational learning experiences (Mezirow, 1997) impacted CITs’ self-reported skill development on the Professional Performance Review Policy Standards (PPRPS; McAdams, Foster, & Ward, 2007) assessment tool and how reflective journaling impacted CITs’ personal development. Method Participants The current study involved 17 counseling graduate students ( N = 17) at a Midwestern university, with eight students (47%) pursuing a specialty in clinical mental health counseling, 8 students (47%) pursuing addictions counseling and one student (6%) pursuing school counseling. One student was in the first year of graduate training (6%), 12 students (71%) were in their second year and 4 (24%) were in their third year. Four students (24%) identified as male and 13 students (76%) as female. Researchers collected demographic data only during the initial stage of data collection, or Time 1. At Times 2 and 3 of data collection, 21 students participated in the study; however, demographic data was obtained for only 17 student participants. Instrumentation The PPRPS (McAdams, Foster, & Ward, 2007) was used to evaluate participants’ self-reported perceptions of their dispositions and skills. The PPRPS is a 10-item survey with each item rated on a 5-point Likert scale. The 10 dispositions and skills measured on the PPRPS include the following: (a) openness to new ideas, (b) flexibility, (c) cooperativeness with others, (d) willingness to accept and use feedback, (e) awareness of own impact on others, (f) ability to deal with conflict, (g) ability to accept personal responsibility, (h) ability to express feelings effectively and appropriately, (i) attention to ethical and legal considerations, and (j) initiative and motivation. Currently, no psychometric information is available for the PPRPS survey. Procedure Graduate counseling students were invited to enroll in an elective 1-hour graduate seminar. Students were notified of this opportunity via a university flyer containing the following message: “Sign up now for this new seminar opportunity which seeks to infuse creative, transformational learning exercises for personal and professional counselor growth and development into a 2-day class.” As students signed up for the course, they were informed that the course would involve collecting pretest data and data from three subsequent posttests using the PPRPS survey, in which students would be asked to rate themselves on 10 counselor skills and dispositions. Students also received the opportunity to engage in a self-reflective journaling exercise that accompanied the experiential activities used throughout the seminar. Students were informed that completion of the PPRPS was mandatory for the purposes of the seminar, but that the data gleaned from the surveys and self- reflective journals would only be used for the purposes of this study with their informed consent. The seminar consisted of a 2-day class in which various counselor development topics were taught and activities were facilitated. The activities were regarded as transformational learning opportunities or