Week 8

            As I read the assigned texts for this week, I recalled a conversation with someone who was a school psychologist.  She was somewhat dismayed that the majority of her time in the schools was spent administering tests.  Yet this was how the school district utilized her as she traveled to several schools within the district.  This did not mesh well with what she had hoped to do as a school psychologist.  However, this would seem to be consistent with the findings in the Giordano (1997) article.  In the article they reported that most testing in a school became the responsibility of the school psychologist, with the school counselor doing very little testing.  District protocol and precedent not withstanding, I am wondering whether testing might also be an important task for the school counselor.  As we have learned, testing seems to benefit from occurring within the context of a continuing counseling relationship.  Oftentimes, it is the counselor who has the opportunity for that continuing relationship.  Yet many instruments may require training beyond the scope of most school counselors.  I would imagine that fiscal issues might stand in the way of training and purchasing for many assessments.  I was intrigued, yet not surprised that counselors tended to utilize a very limited number of assessments, and many of them were the old standards.   In the end practicality often supersedes other concerns or desires.  It would seem that there was no disagreement about the benefit of assessment, but the difficulty comes in putting things into practice. 

Reference

Giordano, Fransesca G., Schwiebert, Valerie L. (1997) School counselors' perceptions of the usefulness of standardized tests, frequency of their use, School Counselor. Vol. 44, Issue 3.