Providing a Model for Improving the Professional Competencies of Educational Counselors in Providing Services to First-Grade High School Students (Case Study: Tehran Education)

Document Type : Scientific - Research

Authors

1 Ph.D. student in Educational Management, Department of Educational Management, Faculty of Management and Economics, Sciences and Researches Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

2 PhD in Educational Management, Associate Professor, Department of Educational Management, Faculty of Management and Economics, Sciences and Researches Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

3 PhD in Social Medicine, Visiting Assistant Professor, Faculty of Management and Economics, Sciences and Researches Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

4 PhD in Higher Education Management, Associate Professor, Department of Higher Education Management, Faculty of Management and Economics, Sciences and Researches Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Objectives: This study aimed to provide a model for improving the professional competencies of educational counselors in providing to first-grade high school students.
Materials and Methods: The present study was exploratory descriptive, and in terms of approach, it was a mixed (qualitative-quantitative) one. In the qualitative section based on conducting exploratory interviews in a semi-structured manner with experts, dimensions and components were identified and in a small part, data were collected using a questionnaire. Participants in the qualitative section included 14 experts in the field of counseling who were selected by using purposive non-probabilistic sampling (judgmental). In the quantitative section, the statistical population was all counselors in 19 districts of Tehran working in girls and boys schools in the first secondary school (900 counselors) and the multi-stage cluster sampling method was used to determine the sample size (269 people) obtained by the Morgan table. Considering the two parts of the research (qualitative and quantitative), the validity and the reliability of the research tools were also discussed in two parts. In the qualitative part to measure the validity of qualitative data, the capability criterion (Guba and Lincoln, 2000) was used; it was validated from the perspective of 4 criteria of validity, transferability, reliability, and validity of the research instrument. Also, to calculate the reliability in this section, 4 interviews were selected as a sample and then each of them was re-performed and coded at a specified time interval. The specified codes were then compared at 2-time intervals. The reliability of the retest interviews was calculated to be 0.81 which indicates the reliability of the coding. In the quantitative part, 3 methods were used to measure validity; content validity, convergent validity test, and divergent validity. Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used to measure reliability. Also, the method of data analysis in the qualitative part was the theme analysis method, and in the quantitative part was the information in the questionnaires coded and analyzed using SPSS and Lisrel statistical software in two descriptive and inferential parts. In addition, a significant level has been considered in all research hypotheses (α=0.05). 
Discussion and Conclusions: The findings obtained from the qualitative data analysis showed that the model for improving the professional competencies of educational consultants includes 4 dimensions and 18 components. So that the dimensions of technical skills of the consultant (including 4 components), personality characteristics of the consultant (including 6 components), managerial skills of the consultant (including 3 components), and finally psychological skills of the consultant (including 5 components) can be the variance of professional qualifications. Counselors providing services to the students of the first secondary level should explain well at the confidence level of 95%. Besides, among the 4 independent variables of the research model, the counselor's personality characteristics variable was the most explanatory of the variance of the counselors' professional qualifications in providing services to the first secondary students with a value of 0.96, followed by the counselor's psychological skills variable with 0.76.

Keywords

References

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