Some of us love the idea of helping people solve their problems; that is the sign of a future therapist or counselor. You may like to study certain online counseling courses for your counseling career. You will work with different people including children, adolescent, and adult. In most cases, becoming a counselor requires that you must have received your master degree in a reliable and accredited institution either online or on-campus. Apart from this requirements, before you can practice as a professional counselor either in schools or other centers that has to do with both academic and mental health issues; you must have carried out internship, write your licensure exam and then be awarded your licensure after the completion of a supervised fieldwork under several hours as may be set by a particular institution. There are various counseling programs online that you can select and decide to pursue your career on it. I will provide necessary information about them so that you will easily be able to determine which you should go for.
By earning a counseling degree, you will be trained to help solve problems for people in terms of social, psychological, emotional, and academic and so on. Lots of prediction has been made that counseling therapy will soon grow in high demand. Between 20161 and 2026, it has been predicted by BLS (Bureau of Labor and Statistics that careers under counseling will receive boom in the labor market. This is a good idea for anyone that has the intention of becoming a counselor. If you look at the situation around your environment, you will realize that substance abuse, behavioral disorders are rampant, and therefore there will be a need for mental health counselors which will make the number increase by 23%.
Online Counseling Courses and Programs
In case you need to know and identify the various types of counseling courses online, here they are being listed below:
- Marriage and family therapy
- Ethics in applied counseling psychology
- Multicultural issues in counseling psychology
- Psychopharmacology
- Child and adolescent counseling
- Quantitative and qualitative research in applied psychology
- Survey and statistical methods
- Aging psychology
- Educational psychology
- Forensic psychology
The Pathway to Becoming a Professional Counselor
To become a professional counselor, you must firstly; pass through some pathways of which the first step is to earn a bachelor degree in relation with psychology. However, it is advisable for you to earn your master’s degree before applying for a counsellorship program, because most of the states have set their minimum requirement to become a counselor, to begin with, a master’s degree.
You will learn how to think critically, develop communication skills perfectly, and then gain an understanding of the importance of counseling theories and concepts. Apart from acquiring these vital skills, you will find the opportunity to make professional connections through networking with class instructors, peers, and counseling practitioners. The kind of relationship you make when you were in school will create opportunities for a job for you especially if you are one of the brightest students during the course of study. If you perform very well, you may find available jobs in your school career services department. There could be available jobs and internships, resume help and interview workshops.
How useful is a Bachelors Degree in Counseling
In counseling, it almost appears like Bachelor Degree is not useful but if you look deeply into the career, you will realize that the Bachelor’s degree is the first step to becoming any professional in all of the counseling courses or programs such as marriage and family therapist, mental health practitioner, school counselor and the rest. Although, it is generally accepted that the main requirement for you to trained as a counselor and then be licensed is a master’s degree. With your Bachelor’s Degree, you can take that first step to practice your acquired knowledge in psychology and emotional therapy. You will be able to work with individual or group that is socially, emotionally or physically disabled to regain their confidence and then reclaim their independence in life.
Common requirements for the Programs Above
The entire programs above have a common requirement in which the first step to obtaining them is basically Bachelor’s degree in a course related to psychology but most of the institutions have ruled that the minimum of master’s degree is required to become a professional in any of the fields you chose. The programs are meant for those who are really serious and mentally sound, therefore the processes of obtaining the license to practice them are not always easy; you will have to undergo long hours of fieldwork with professional supervision by a senior counselor who is highly experienced in your career field. Besides this, you will have to take an exam, pass it before you will be issued a license in the state your state of residence as a practical counselor.
Different type of Counselors
Just as we have various types of field in counseling; automatically, we have different types of counselors. I have decided to include this in this article as a welcome development to enlighten us more on what we may become of the counseling field tomorrow. You know, if you have the theoretical knowledge of the description of a place, once you get there in reality, it will not be difficult for you to recognize some areas there since you have been informed of the shapes and colors. The same thing is happening to you right now. I want to give you an overview of the types of counselors we have.
These are the various types of counselors we have and each of them in one way or the other encompasses each of the courses above.
- General Counselor
- Mental health Counselor
- Rehabilitation Counselor
- School Counselor
- Marriage and Family Counselor
I shall explain each of the various counselors we have and then, you will automatically understand each area they encompass among the programs above.
General Counselor
From the name, it should be understood that a general counselor specializes in handling almost every kind of problems involving mental health issues. He can work with both individual and group of people as a professional to help them find a solution to their problems. He or she uses a critical approach to gather information from their clients which they use as a means to solve their issue for them. Possibly, the client is involved in substance abuse or mental health problems. A general counselor helps their clients suggest a treatment method to overcome the problem that is an exacting negative impact on their health.
Mental Health Counselor
This type of counselor works with clients that either have been diagnosed with mental health issues or are showing a sign of mental health issue and yet to be diagnosed. They help their clients to fight the war against depression, anxiety, bad behaviors, and addictions in general. Sometimes, the counselor may choose to work with the patient alone or along the relative in order to get vital information on how they can help curb the problem together. A mental health therapist can work with both inpatient and outpatient.
Rehabilitation Counselor
This counselor is trained to be highly skillful in working with people with disabilities to cope with physical, emotional and vocational consequences of their conditions. You may not like to misunderstand a physical counselor with a rehabilitation counselor. As rehabilitation counselor focuses on the psychological and logistical issues of the aspect of their conditions while a physical counselor or therapist handles the aspect of the pain or mobility.
School Counselor
The utmost duty of this counselor is to work with children, adolescents, and young adult or different strategies they can apply to develop their academic skills. He or she helps them to solve their learning problem and then come up with various strategies the students can apply for learning to be easy for them. Sometimes, this type of counselor can involve both students’ parents and teacher in the therapy so as to gather vital information that will aid in giving professional therapy. This therapist, equally advice students and train them to become responsible adults when they grow older in life.
Marriage and Family Counselor
The primary goal of this type of counselor is to restore peace and harmony in the family background. He or she helps to solve both physical and psychological issues affecting the family and the marriage. A marriage and family counselor can find out the problem of a family through the high skills of critical thinking and observations to arrive at a professional solution for the marriage issue between couples.
Is there a Difference between a Psychology and a Counselor
Is there a difference between being a psychologist and being a counselor? This is an interesting question that needed to be solved. Yes, there is a difference between these two professions. They have differences concerning whom they work with and how they apply their treatment on their clients. Apart from this difference, a wider difference is also found in the level of education they attain. Most of the psychologists will have to acquire a doctoral degree while most counselors can stop at the master’s degree to practice therapy. A psychiatrist should also not be misunderstood to be a psychologist, as he or she is a medical doctor who attended medical school to be able to prescribe drugs and treatment for their patients; though sometimes, a psychologist or a counselor can work with a psychiatric doctor during the treatment of a patient or group.
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