TPC-Journal-V5-Issue4

The Professional Counselor /Volume 5, Issue 4 480 Finally, on the other end of the spectrum from the previous theme, some respondents said they would encourage any of their students who wished to pursue a doctorate, making up the third theme, encourage student regardless . A respondent expressed the opinion, “ One can never know the success level of prospective doctoral student[s]. If they have the desire, they should be encouraged to pursue their goal.” In another hypothetical situation, researchers asked respondents the following: Hypothetically, a master’s student who has the GOAL OF becoming a FACULTY MEMBER asks you for advice. The question asked is how many years of post-master’s clinical experience the student should obtain prior to applying to a doctoral program. What would your advice be? There were 136 respondents to this question. Forty-nine percent would advise at least 2 years of post-master’s clinical experience, 21% would advise the student to enter the doctoral program right away without any experience, 13% would advise obtaining at least 3 years of experience, 14% would advise at least 1 year, 3% would advise at least 5 years, and none would advise more than 5 years. Two themes emerged related to the associated rationale for respondents’ choices to this question: (1) depends on personal factors of the student and (2) enough time to gain experience. The first theme, depends on personal factors of the student, included factors such as quality of the student, their readiness and maturity level, as well as doctoral program of interest. One respondent spoke to the importance of the student’s readiness: If the student feels ready to enter the doctoral program, then I would encourage them. I would tell them to trust their own sense of timing. I would not recommend it if they were just trying to get through without being fully interested, eager and invested in the program. Another respondent stressed the importance of considering each student and the quality of master’s performance and desires for the future: I did not respond here because it does not include an “it depends” answer, as it depends what experience they have, what they have gained in their master’s program, have they gone above and beyond the call of doing the basic requirements of clinical internship in the master’s program and what type of faculty member are they hoping to be (e.g., teaching only, research heavy, etc.). Thus, it really depends on the uniqueness of each student as to what I would recommend. Finally in this theme, some respondents referred to the importance of considering which doctoral programs the student is interested in applying to. One respondent spoke to this consideration here: Doctoral programs are designed differently. Some are designed to have clinical hours built in and are good for individuals going straight through while other programs require 2–5 years of work experience in the field and have less supervision and clinical hours. Other respondents reported that having experience before entering a doctoral program was critical, regardless of the student, making up the second theme, enough time to gain experience . These respondents spoke to needing enough experience to earn licensure and supervision licensure and to develop a sense of professional identity first. Many also felt students should get a sense of the field before entering a doctoral program to see if they would prefer to practice at the master’s level. The