Matthew E. Lemberger

Advocating Student-Within-Environment A Humanistic Approach for Therapists to Animate Social Justice in the Schools

The authors present an overview of a therapeutic perspective for school therapists (counselors, psychologists, social workers) based on humanistic and social justice principles called Advocating Student-within-Environment (ASE). An ASE-influenced school therapist is directed by the assumption that the student has to be a participant in any social change that is proffered on that student’s behalf. To operate on this assumption, an ASE school therapist is concerned with maximizing student agency by supporting the development of the student’s regulatory and connectedness skills, while advocating for that student with stakeholders and through relevant social structures. In this article, the philosophic bases will be introduced, in addition to recommendations for incorporating this approach into practice in schools.

Bases for a More Socially Just Humanistic Praxis

The authors suggest that social justice praxis is required of any humanistic practitioner. Inspired by a metamodern interpretation of humanistic psychology, the authors offer five propositions for the bases of a socially just humanistic praxis. Based on these propositions, the authors suggest that the humanist practitioner consider socially just certitudes while remaining open to multiple manifestations of justice. Additionally, social justice praxis will require the humanist to utilize a variety of tactics to meet the particular needs of oppressed individuals and groups.

The Influence of Repeated Exposure to the Student Success Skills Program on Middle School Students’ Feelings of Connectedness, Behavioral and Metacognitive Skills, and Reading Achievement

The authors of the current study examined the influence of repeated exposure to the Student Success Skills (SSS) counseling intervention program on feelings of connectedness, behavioral and metacognitive skills, and reading achievement for 201 students in a predominately Hispanic, low-income middle school district in the Southwest United States. Results from multiple path analyses indicated model fits based on SSS participation for behavioral regulation for the treatment group, feelings of connectedness for females in the treatment group, and reading growth for low-achieving students.

Influence of a Supervised Mentoring Program on the Achievement of Low‐Income South Korean Students

This study examined the effectiveness of a supervised mentoring program designed to improve the academic achievement of 834 low‐income elementary and secondary school students in Seoul, South Korea. When compared to the control group, both elementary and middle school students exposed to the mentoring program improved in mathematic and reading comprehension, with an effect size .29 and .33 respectively. Additionally, the duration of the mentoring relationship affected the achievement of participating students. These findings provide support for mentoring programs as a means to reduce resource inequity in low‐income school districts and, in so doing, contribute to higher levels of achievement.

A person-centered humanistic approach to performing evidence-based school counseling research

ABSTRACT The authors propose a process for school counseling researchers to conduct evidence-based research consistent to the person-centered humanistic perspective. Informed by three tenets for research, including relationship building in the school community, the use of moderators pertaining to the student and the therapeutic relationship, and valuing contextual-hermeneutical interpretations over objectivity in the interpretation and reporting of results.

Multilevel Modeling for Research in Group Work

Researchers in group counseling often encounter complex data from individual clients who are members of a group. Clients in the same group may be more similar than clients from different groups and this can lead to violations of statistical assumptions. The complexity of the data also means that predictors and outcomes can be measured at both the client and the group level. Researcher questions may focus on variables at the client level or the group level, or the interaction of client and group level variables. In this article, we introduce multilevel modeling as a tool that can be used both to account for the complex structure of the data and to incorporate variables at both the client and group levels. A published group counseling study is used as an example.

Using the Transcultural Adlerian Conceptualization and Therapy (TACT) Model to Depict the Influence of Race-Based Trauma

The authors of this article discuss race-based trauma as it might be explained by Adlerian theoretical tenets. To illustrate the relevance of Adler’s theory to race-based trauma, the authors introduce the Transcultural Adlerian Conceptualization and Therapy (TACT) model. The TACT model is used to illustrate how issues such as institutional and internalized racism can affect the lifestyle of the individual, including personal and social features. Race-based trauma can result in devitalizing consequences for the individual and the whole of society that reflect other forms of posttrauma experience.

Student Success Skills: An Evidence-based Cognitive and Social Change Theory for Student Achievement

An overview of the Student Success Skills (SSS) program is offered, including descriptions of the curricular structure, extant research support related to SSS effectiveness for academic achievement and improved school behaviors, and a theory of change for student development. Recent research has demonstrated the value of the SSS program as it connects to student academic achievement and related learning outcomes. To demonstrate how these findings can be generalized as a theory of change in myriad educational circumstances, specific SSS curricular skills and strategies are explicated, including those that are cognitive, attitudinal, self-regulatory, behavioral, and social.

Introduction to the Special Issue on Person-Centered Approaches in Schools

This special issue of the Person-Centered and Experiential Psychotherapies journal was commissioned to emphasize the usefulness of person-centered approaches in schooling practices and contexts, broadly defined. In Rogers’ (e.g. 1951, 1969, 1977) original writings he often discussed the similitude between psychotherapeutic and educational behaviors. This correspondence is not terribly surprising given that sufficient expressions of psychotherapy and learning are both contingent on the sharing of the core conditions including congruence, unconditional positive regard, and empathetic understanding (Rogers, 1951). In this way, the person as client or learner is prioritized in a manner that the means for actualized living or learning is emphasized and the facilitative relationship prized. Taxonomical distinctions between psychotherapy and formal educational practices are often blurred, but Rogers (1969) generally demurred these distinctions as unnecessary and even potentially deleterious to the person as client or learner. Contemporary educational scholars have slowly adopted a similar position, especially seen in the literatures pertaining to social-emotional learning and its influence on the classroom climate or student learning behaviors (see Blair, 2002; Durlak, Weissberg, Dymnicki, Taylor, & Schellinger, 2011; Sklad, Diekstra, De Ritter, Ben, & Gravesteijn, 2012). Specific to the field of counseling in the USA, as endorsed by the American Counseling Association and the American School Counseling Association, counseling practice includes psychotherapeutic interventions but also system support, educational and learning activities, social justice advocacy, and career planning and development. Considered together, the learning sciences and the school counseling profession have supported Rogers’ original posits pertaining to education of the whole person, with a special focus on relational and experiential opportunities in schools. Unfortunately, there appears to be a fracture between the academic and professional recommendations and the praxis in schools; generally speaking, many school systems, educators and their various stakeholders are becoming ideologically less concerned with humanizing the whole person and, instead, each proffer educational behaviors that are too often reductionistic and dehumanizing. The authors of the four articles included in this special issue each evoke the spirit of Rogers’ beliefs about learning. Together they identify a myriad challenges in contemporary schools and offer a person-centered alternative. Similar to Rogers, the foci across the articles are not limited to traditional definitions of psychotherapy or educational

Advancing the Humanistic Aesthetic as a Therapeutic Mechanism for Client Growth

The authors present a framework designed to assist the counselor in integrating the qualities of art and creativity in therapeutic intervention. This framework is based on the idea that client disclosures are a personal aesthetic. We suggest that the client’s construction of a personal aesthetic, or the client’s subjective interpretation and expression of experience, can be understood as an ideal way of being. This process of counseling includes eliciting the client’s creative aesthetic expression within the interview as a means to clarify how the client might use such expressions toward self-actualization.