Assignment 1: First Session

In Module 4, you learned about the direct and indirect functions performed by clinical mental health counselors before, during, after, and outside the counseling relationship. You were taught that counseling is a process that occurs in stages. At each stage, clinical mental health counselors engage in a variety of activities that are purposeful and intentional. Some of the activities performed by counselors during those stages include building the relationship and establishing rapport, gathering information, conceptualizing the case, and performing assessment and diagnosis where appropriate, with the end goal and activity being the collaborative development of an appropriate treatment plan. As you think about the counseling process and the role of the clinical mental health counselor, consider the following scenario:

Scenario:

Aalia is a 17-year-old Muslim female from Pakistan. Her family has been in the United States for 7 years. Aalia was referred to a counselor by her family doctor because she has experienced several behavioral changes over the past 2 months. She takes less interest in school and community activities and has started to isolate herself in her room at home. Her siblings describe her as irritable and moody. Aalia has had occasional crying spells over the past month and she reported unexplained weight loss over the past 2 months. She does not have a formal diagnosis. As you plan for your first session with Aalia, think about what you will do.

Tasks:

In a minimum of 200 words, respond to the following:
• Describe three objectives you hope to accomplish in the first session with Aalia and explain why these objectives are important to accomplish in the early stages of the counseling relationship.
• Discuss any additional information you want to confirm or gather from the doctor, Aalia, and her parents and siblings and describe how you will go about gathering the additional information.
• Discuss what kind of assessment you will want or need to conduct.
• Explain how what you learned in Module 4 will contribute to your professional growth as a new counselor-in-training.
• Your discussion should clearly reflect your thoughtful and logical analysis of the information.
Support your rationale and analysis by using at least two resources from professional literature in your response. Professional literature may include peer-reviewed journal articles you can access through the Argosy University online library resources; relevant textbooks; and websites created by professional organizations, agencies, or institutions (websites ending in .edu or .gov).

Assignment 2: RA 1: Advocacy in Action Presentation
Description of RA 1:
In this assignment, you will develop an advocacy plan based on the scenario below. Your plan will incorporate the relevant American Counseling Association (ACA) Advocacy Competencies and Competency Domains and your approach to facilitating client wellness.

Scenario:
You have been hired as a counselor in a local community agency that offers services to victims and survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV). Your first client is a 25-year-old female war veteran who returned from Afghanistan 1 year ago. She enlisted in the army right after high school and has been married for 7 years. She reports that the physical abuse started in the third year of her marriage. She describes serving in Afghanistan as a "piece of cake" compared to what she experiences at home. Since returning from Afghanistan, and being discharged from the Army, your client acknowledges that her husband has physically abused her at least once a month. She wants to leave but states that she has no place to go and cannot find a job. She expresses disappointment over the treatment she has received from the government since returning home. She suffers from depression and insomnia, and it is believed that she may suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Your client reports that she has lost twenty pounds in the last 3 months. She describes feeling trapped, isolated, alone, and scared and is relying on you to help her. You have been asked to present your case at the treatment team meeting in two weeks. You have decided to prepare a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation that emphasizes your advocacy and wellness approach to working with the client.

Instructions:
1. Review the ACA Advocacy Competencies and Competency Domains.
Click here to read about ACA Advocacy Competencies and Competency Domains.
2. Create a presentation that:
a. Introduces your advocacy plan (who, what, and why?).
b. Elaborates on the relevant competency domains that you believe are most applicable to your work with the client.
c. Describes how you will use the related counselor advocacy competencies to assist your client (be specific regarding each relevant counselor competency per domain).
d. Identifies issues in your client's life that affect her overall wellness.
e. Includes suggestions to help your client improve her physical, cognitive, emotional, and social wellness.
3. The presentation should include no more than 10-14 slides.
4. The presentation should be created using a Microsoft PowerPoint template that reflects professional, graduate-level scholarship.
Your final product will be a 10- to 14-slide presentation written in APA format, utilizing at least five scholarly sources. Your presentation should be written in a clear, concise, and organized manner; demonstrate ethical scholarship in accurate representation and attribution of sources; and display accurate spelling, grammar, and punctuation.

Assignment 3: Developing Multicultural Competency
This module highlighted the importance of cultural diversity and multicultural issues in clinical mental health counseling (CMHC). You have learned the value of examining human growth and development within a multicultural context that involves using multicultural counseling and techniques. Because we all belong to multiple cultural groups based on aspects such as race/ethnicity, religion, sexual/affectional orientation, gender, geographic location, language, and socioeconomic status, many believe that all counseling is multicultural. Given today's changing social, political, and cultural climate, becoming a culturally competent counselor is paramount for the success of an ethically responsible professional. One important step in developing multicultural competence is ongoing self-reflection and personal awareness.
Personal awareness begins with an in-depth look at your personal core values, morals, beliefs, and past experiences. Being aware of how these issues collectively shape your perceptions about life, people and their problems, and what's right or wrong or good or bad can make the difference in whether you practice ethically and responsibly or recklessly, potentially putting your clients in harm's way. Understanding your culture and examining your cultural beliefs is a prerequisite to developing the multicultural competence needed to respect human diversity.

Tasks:
In a minimum of 200 words, post to the Discussion Area your response to the following:
• Discuss how your cultural beliefs, values, morals, and past experiences could be a challenge when you counsel clients from diverse backgrounds.
• Describe your plan to overcome the challenges identified above.
• As part of your plan, indicate if your challenges require improvement in the area of self-awareness, knowledge, or skills.
• Explain how the learning from this module will contribute to your professional growth as a new counselor-in-training.
• Your discussion should clearly reflect your thoughtful and logical analysis of the information.
Support your rationale and analysis by using at least two resources from professional literature in your response. Professional literature may include peer-reviewed journal articles you can access through the Argosy University online library resources; relevant textbooks; and websites created by professional organizations, agencies, or institutions (websites ending in .edu or .gov).

Assignment 4: Working Ahead on RA 2
In RA 2, you will investigate a topic of interest to you that is relevant to professional counseling. Consider choosing a topic appropriate to an area in which you hope to or may consider specializing. The topic may address a specific population, a disorder or a diagnosis, a treatment method or technique, a current professional issue, or a social justice issue in counseling. The literature review is designed to increase your knowledge of the topic and improve your clinical mental health counseling practice or service delivery. Information included in the literature review should be current and scholarly in order to be relevant. Your final product will be an 8- to 10-page Microsoft Word document written in APA format, utilizing at least 10 scholarly sources.

Assignment 5: Managed Care in Counseling
In this module, you learned about topics and issues in counseling that impact how counselors perform counseling and related services. You were provided with a glimpse into how counselors conceptualize and treat the whole person; incorporate wellness, spirituality, and mindfulness into the counseling approach; and engage in crisis intervention, disaster response, and suicide risk assessment. These professional topics have resulted in extremely popular services provided by clinical mental health counselors. How counselors define, identify, and combat fatigue, stress, and burnout through self-care and wellness was also emphasized in this module. Finally, the pros and cons of managed care and the relationship between evidence-based practices, managed care, and treatment outcomes were introduced to you. As counselors-in-training, it is important to remain constantly updated about the field. Being familiar with specific topics in counseling will inform your practice and help you identify areas of interest for additional training.
Managed care is a frequently discussed and debated topic among mental health professionals. Managed care organizations encourage short-term, brief therapy and mandate the use of evidence-based practices. Using the Argosy University online library resources, locate one peer-reviewed journal article that describes the use of brief or solution-focused therapy with a client or population of interest to you. Post your article as an attachment in the Discussion Area.

Tasks:
In a minimum of 200 words, post to the Discussion Area your response to the following:
• Summarize the article you selected by describing:
o The purpose of the article
o The client/population mentioned in the article
o How brief or solution-focused therapy was used with the client/population
o What other theories could apply with the client/population
o The outcomes/results of the use of brief or solution-focused therapy
• Looking through the lens of managed care, describe how counselors, clients, and managed care organizations benefit from brief or solution-focused therapy.
• Looking through the same lens, provide an argument to managed care organizations that describe the disadvantages associated with the use of brief or solution-focused therapy.
• Further explain what you perceive to be the main advantages and disadvantages of managed care. Be sure to elaborate rather than regurgitate the material covered in the module and assigned readings.
• Explain how the learning from this module will contribute to your professional growth as a new counselor-in-training.
• Your discussion should clearly reflect your thoughtful and logical analysis of the information.