Counselor competencies and personality traits at secondary schools in Kuwait
✍ Scribed by Siham Abu-Eita; Nadia Sherif
- Publisher
- Springer US
- Year
- 1990
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 609 KB
- Volume
- 13
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0165-0653
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
The aim of this research is to study the effective competencies and personality traits of secondary school counselors. A questionnaire was designed to measure counselor competencies, and a simple one way analysis of variance was used for each major competency area to test the differences between counselors who were rated high or low by their supervisors. The 16 Personality Factor Test was also administered to measure differences in personality traits between the two counselor groups. The results are consistent with previous research. It was also found that there are differences between high and low rated counselors in several personality traits.
Counselors who are working at high schools in Kuwait have a bachelor's degree in psychology, and in addition have many in-service training programs in counseling. At present, however, there is no specialized degree in counseling. The activities of the school counselors are defined in the Ministry of Education decree of 1978, which describes the school counselor role.
The purpose of this study was to define effective counselor competencies and personality traits in order to develop further pre-service and in-service training programs. These would therefore enable the school counselor in Kuwait to provide better counseling services.
Guidance and counseling in Kuwait
Social services in the schools began in 1966, and up to 1978 social workers were responsible for 'pupil personnel services' in the schools, including work usually offered by counselors. Guidance and counseling programs were established in Kuwait in 1978. In that year educational counselors assumed responsibilities for some of the functions previously assumed by the social worker (career, emotional and educational counseling).
At present counselors work only in high schools participating in the credit course system, where students are able to make choices in the school