TPC Journal-Vol 10- Issue 3-FULL ISSUE

The Professional Counselor | Volume 10, Issue 3 319 needed to address institutional and society barriers that impede access, equity, and success for clients” (CACREP, 2015, Standard F.1.e., p. 10). Further, the curriculum guidelines for social and cultural diversity emphasize counselor advocacy when instructing counselor educators to cover “strategies for identifying and eliminating barriers, prejudices and processes of intentional and unintentional oppression and discrimination” (CACREP, 2015, Standard F.2.h., p. 11). Although mass incarceration and its effects are not specifically mentioned in the ACA Code of Ethics or CACREP standards, these broad directives provide support for the specific argument that the scope of this crisis and its impact on families require attention in counselor training. Consequently, the purpose of this research study is to describe the current state of how counselor educators are providing training to counselor trainees to support families of the incarcerated. The Rise of Mass Incarceration The national epidemic of increasing imprisonment rates, commonly referred to as mass incarceration, has been a topic of alarm for nearly five decades (Garland, 2001; Glaze & Maruschak, 2008; Graham & Harris, 2013; A. Lopez & Burt, 2013; C. Lopez & Bhat, 2007; National Research Council [NRC], 2014; Sykes & Pettit, 2014). Although the United States accounts for 4.4% of the world’s population, nearly one quarter (22%) of the world’s prisoners are in the United States (American Psychological Association [APA], 2014; NRC, 2014). According to The Sentencing Project (2012), the United States continues to have the highest incarceration rate in the world, consistently increasing since the mid-1970s. The most recent statistics indicate that the United States has an incarcerated population of 2.2 million individuals (APA, 2014; Kaeble & Cowhig, 2018; NRC, 2014). This represents a 500% increase over the last 40 years (The Sentencing Project, 2012). More than 20% of those released return to incarceration within one year (Durose et al., 2014; Western & Smith, 2018). Researchers have found a correlation between imprisonment and individuals belonging to underserved (e.g., lower levels of education, low income, psychiatric treatment and substance abuse histories) and minority populations (Alexander, 2012; Cnaan et al., 2008; NRC, 2014). Despite the race gap narrowing since 2007, Blacks are imprisoned at a rate 6 times that of Whites and at double the rate for Hispanics (Bronson & Carson, 2019). Because incarceration disproportionately affects minority group members, families of the incarcerated are more likely to be concentrated in minority communities (Graham & Harris, 2013). Consequently, even those children in the community whose parents are not facing incarceration are likely to be impacted by mass incarceration (Wakefield & Wildeman, 2011), as their communities may experience lower incomes, lopsided gender ratios, disrupted social integration and roles, high levels of joblessness, and increased crime (Crutchfield & Weeks, 2015). An Invisible Group Results from the National Survey of Children’s Health (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2018) found that more than 7% or 5 million children in the United States have experienced a parent being incarcerated. Gathering current statistics is difficult for researchers. The majority of data on children of incarcerated parents has measured the number of parents in prison, leaving unknown data about the number of parents spending time in jail (Cramer et al., 2017). Because of this, there is reason to believe that the current number of children of incarcerated parents exceeds previous findings of 2.7 million children. Children of incarcerated parents have frequently been described as an invisible group (Bernstein, 2005; Bouchet, 2008) that bears the collateral consequences of mass incarceration. There are many reasons for the invisibility. Although the children have not committed any crimes, their parent’s