Assignment: Gender Career Counseling

Assignment: Gender Career Counseling
Assignment: Gender Career Counseling
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Assignment: Gender as an Issue in Career Counseling
Issues that negatively impact the career development of women
Pregnancy – planned or unplanned
Inequities in salary, sexual harassment and various forms of discrimination
Time spent away from job because of child bearing
Willingness to sacrifice advancement so that a spouse can advance
Tradition and sex-role stereotyping may have persuaded women to stay away from STEM fields
This is information is helpful to remind career counselors of 2 types of obligations:
Make clients aware of what lies ahead in the work environment and help them develop coping skills
Assert ourselves to ameliorate oppressive forces in organizations
Sociological Perspective (Women)
Occupational sociologists have long recognized the influence of scholastic ability, family status and community variables in occupational success.
Since 1982 women earn more college degrees than men. In general, women are now better educated than men.
Family roles impact the career development of both men and women but have a greater impact on women than men
Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Individuals
Barriers placed on these individuals by mainstream society
Coping with discrimination may result in lower self-esteem
Virtually ignored in the literature
Career counselors should begin with soul searching about their own beliefs
21 states plus the District of Columbia have laws that prohibit sexual orientation discrimination in both public and private jobs.
Pope and colleagues suggest that career counselors need to become advocates for the GLBT clients
Pope and colleagues point out that “coming out” in a 2-pronged process
First accepting one’s own sexuality
Second coming out to others
Career Counseling: Models and Methods
Most counselors tend to be eclectic borrowing from several theories
Brown believes that the age of the clients, nature of the clients served, the number of people to be served and the context (large group vs. individual), will influence your choice of an approach to career development
Spokane, Luchetta and Richwine (2002)
Does the approach allow for the development of the social support needed to move forward into the future?
Social support is important in shaping career aspirations and may be more important for clients from groups marginalized by societal bias
Does the approach allow individuals to gain information about themselves and their work environment?
When working with children, Gottfredson’s theory of circumscription and compromise should be incorporated to make children aware that they may have eliminated some occupations from their thinking prematurely based on sex-role stereotypes, social status and other factors.
Does the approach provide a framework for decision making?
Cognitive Information Processing Approach (Peterson, et al)
Super
Holland
Does the approach allow for crystallizing and cognitive rehearsal of vocational aspirations?
Does the approach mobilize the individual to move ahead in a constructive manner?