ASCA Code of Ethics
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| Preamble | Section A | Section B | Section C | Section D | Section E | Section F | Section G |
ASCA's Ethical Standards for School Counselors were adopted by the ASCA Delegate Assembly, March 19, 1984 and revised, March 27, 1992, June 25, 1998, and June 26, 2004, and most recently in 2010.
The American School Counselor Association (ASCA) is a professional organization whose members are school counselors certified/licensed in school counseling with unique qualifications and skills to address all students’ academic, personal/social and career development needs. Members are also school counseling program directors/supervisors and counselor educators. These ethical standards are the ethical responsibility of school counselors. School counseling program directors/supervisors should know them and provide support for practitioners to uphold them. School counselor educators should know them, teach them to their students and provide support for school counseling candidates to uphold them. Professional school counselors are advocates, leaders, collaborators and consultants who create opportunities for equity in access and success in educational opportunities by connecting their programs to the mission of schools and subscribing to the following tenets of professional responsibility:
• Each person has the right to be respected, be treated with dignity and have access to a comprehensive school counseling program that advocates for and affirms all students from diverse populations including: ethnic/racial identity, age, economic status, abilities/disabilities, language, immigration status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity/expression, family type, religious/spiritual identity and appearance.
• Each person has the right to receive the information and support needed to move toward self-direction and self-development and affirmation within one’s group identities, with special care being given to students who have historically not received adequate educational services, e.g., students of color, students living at a low socio-economic status, students with disabilities and students from non-dominant language backgrounds.
• Each person has the right to understand the full magnitude and meaning of his/her educational choices and how those choices will affect future opportunities.
• Each person has the right to privacy and thereby the right to expect the school-counselor/student relationship to comply with all laws, policies and ethical standards pertaining to confidentiality in the school setting.
• Each person has the right to feel safe in school environments that school counselors help create, free from abuse, bullying, neglect, harassment or other forms of violence. In this document, ASCA specifies the principles of ethical behavior necessary to maintain the high standards of integrity, leadership and professionalism among its members. The Ethical Standards for School Counselors were developed to clarify the nature of ethical responsibilities held in common by school counselors, supervisors/directors of school counseling programs and school counselor educators. The purposes of this document are to: (Adopted 1984; revised 1992, 1998, 2004 and 2010)
• Serve as a guide for the ethical practices of all professional school counselors, supervisors/directors of school counseling programs and school counselor educators regardless of level, area, population served or membership in this professional association;
• Provide self-appraisal and peer evaluations regarding school counselors’ responsibilities to students, parents/guardians, colleagues and professional associates, schools, communities and the counseling profession; and
• Inform all stakeholders, including students, parents and guardians, teachers, administrators, community members and courts of justice, of best ethical practices, values and expected behaviors of the school counseling professional.
A.1. Responsibilities to Students
Professional school counselors:
a. Have a primary obligation to the students, who are to be treated with dignity and respect as unique individuals.
b. Are concerned with the educational, academic, career, personal and social needs and encourage the maximum development of every student.
c. Respect students’ values, beliefs and cultural background and do not impose the school counselor’s personal values on students or
their families.
d. Are knowledgeable of laws, regulations and policies relating to students and strive to protect and inform students regarding their
rights.
e. Promote the welfare of individual students and collaborate with them to develop an action plan for success.
f. Consider the involvement of support networks valued by the individual students.
g. Understand that professional distance with students is appropriate, and any sexual or romantic relationship with students whether
illegal in the state of practice is considered a grievous breach of ethics and is prohibited regardless of a student’s age.
h. Consider the potential for harm before entering into a relationship with former students or one of their family members.
Professional school counselors:
a. Inform individual students of the purposes, goals, techniques and rules of procedure under which they may receive counseling. Disclosure includes the limits of confidentiality in a developmentally appropriate manner. Informed consent requires competence on the part of students to understand the limits of confidentiality and Ethical Standards for School Counselors therefore, can be difficult to obtain from students of a certain developmental level. Professionals are aware that even though every attempt is made to obtain informed consent it is not always possible and when needed will make counseling decisions on students’ behalf.
b. Explain the limits of confidentiality in appropriate ways such as classroom guidance lessons, the student handbook, school counseling brochures, school Web site, verbal notice or other methods of student, school and community communication in addition to oral notification to individual students.
c. Recognize the complicated nature of confidentiality in schools and consider each case in context. Keep information confidential unless legal requirements demand that confidential information be revealed or a breach is required to prevent serious and foreseeable harm to the student. Serious and foreseeable harm is different for each minor in schools and is defined by students’ developmental and chronological age, the setting, parental rights and the nature of the harm. School counselors consult with appropriate professionals when in doubt as to the validity of an exception.
d. Recognize their primary obligation for confidentiality is to the students but balance that obligation with an understanding of parents’/ guardians’ legal and inherent rights to be the guiding voice in their children’s lives, especially in value-laden issues. Understand the need to balance students’ ethical rights to make choices, their capacity to give consent or assent and parental or familial legal rights and responsibilities to protect these students and make decisions on their behalf.
e. Promote the autonomy and independence of students to the extent possible and use the most appropriate and least intrusive method of breach. The developmental age and the circumstances requiring the breach are considered and as appropriate students are engaged in a discussion about the method and timing of the breach.
f. In absence of state legislation expressly forbidding disclosure, consider the ethical responsibility to provide information to an
identified third party who, by his/her relationship with the student, is at a high risk of contracting a disease that is commonly known to be communicable and fatal. Disclosure requires satisfaction of all of the following conditions:
• Student identifies partner or the partner is highly identifiable
• School counselor recommends the student notify partner and refrain from further high-risk behavior
• Student refuses
• School counselor informs the student of the intent to notify the
partner
• School counselor seeks legal consultation from the school district’s legal representative in writing as to the legalities of informing the partner
g. Request of the court that disclosure not be required when the release of confidential information may potentially harm a student or the counseling relationship.
h. Protect the confidentiality of students’ records and release personal data in accordance with prescribed federal and state laws and school policies including the laws within the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). Student information stored and
transmitted electronically is treated with the same care as traditional student records. Recognize the vulnerability of confidentiality in
electronic communications and only transmit sensitive information electronically in a way that is untraceable to students’ identity.
Critical information such as a student who has a history of suicidal ideation must be conveyed to the receiving school in a personal
contact such as a phone call.
Professional school counselors:
a. Provide students with a comprehensive school counseling program that parallels the ASCA National Model with emphasis on
working jointly with all students to develop personal/social, academic and career goals.
b. Ensure equitable academic, career, post-secondary access and personal/social opportunities for all students through the use of data to help close achievement gaps and opportunity gaps.
c. Provide and advocate for individual students’ career awareness, exploration and post-secondary plans supporting the students’ right to choose from the wide array of options when they leave secondary education.
Professional school counselors:
a. Avoid dual relationships that might impair their objectivity and increase the risk of harm to students (e.g., counseling one’s family members or the children of close friends or associates). If a dual relationship is unavoidable, the school counselor is responsible for taking action to eliminate or reduce the potential for harm to the student through use of safeguards, which might include informed
consent, consultation, supervision and documentation.
b. Maintain appropriate professional distance with students at all times.
c. Avoid dual relationships with students through communication mediums such as social networking sites.
d. Avoid dual relationships with school personnel that might infringe on the integrity of the school counselor/student relationship.
Professional school counselors:
a. Make referrals when necessary or appropriate to outside resources for student and/or family support. Appropriate referrals may necessitate informing both parents/guardians and students of applicable resources and making proper plans for transitions with minimal interruption of services. Students retain the right to discontinue the counseling relationship at any time.
b. Help educate about and prevent personal and social concerns for all students within the school counselor’s scope of education and competence and make necessary referrals when the counseling needs are beyond the individual school counselor’s education and training. Every attempt is made to find appropriate specialized resources for clinical therapeutic topics that are difficult or inappropriate to address in a school setting such as eating disorders, sexual trauma, chemical dependency and other addictions needing sustained clinical duration or assistance.
c. Request a release of information signed by the student and/or parents/guardians when attempting to develop a collaborative relationship with other service providers assigned to the student.
d. Develop a reasonable method of termination of counseling when it becomes apparent that counseling assistance is no longer needed or a referral is necessary to better meet the student’s needs.
Professional school counselors:
a. Screen prospective group members and maintain an awareness of participants’ needs, appropriate fit and personal goals in relation to the group’s intention and focus. The school counselor takes reasonable precautions to protect members from physical and psychological harm resulting from interaction within the group.
b. Recognize that best practice is to notify the parents/guardians of children participating in small groups.
c. Establish clear expectations in the group setting, and clearly state that confidentiality in group counseling cannot be guaranteed. Given the developmental and chronological ages of minors in schools, recognize the tenuous nature of confidentiality for minors renders some topics inappropriate for group work in a school setting.
d. Provide necessary follow up with group members, and document proceedings as appropriate.
e. Develop professional competencies, and maintain appropriate education, training and supervision in group facilitation and any topics specific to the group.
f. Facilitate group work that is brief and solution-focused, working with a variety of academic, career, college and personal/social issues.
Professional school counselors:
a. Inform parents/guardians and/or appropriate authorities when a student poses a danger to self or others. This is to be done after careful deliberation and consultation with other counseling professionals.
b. Report risk assessments to parents when they underscore the need to act on behalf of a child at risk; never negate a risk of harm as students sometimes deceive in order to avoid further scrutiny and/or parental notification.
c. Understand the legal and ethical liability for releasing a student who is in danger to self or others without proper and necessary support for that student.
Professional school counselors:
a. Maintain and secure records necessary for rendering professional services to the student as required by laws, regulations, institutional procedures and confidentiality guidelines.
b. Keep sole-possession records or individual student case notes separate from students’ educational records in keeping with state laws.
c. Recognize the limits of sole-possession records and understand these records are a memory aid for the creator and in absence of privileged communication may be subpoenaed and may become educational records when they are shared or are accessible to others in either verbal or written form or when they include information other than professional opinion or personal observations.
d. Establish a reasonable timeline for purging sole-possession records or case notes. Suggested guidelines include shredding sole possession records when the student transitions to the next level, transfers to another school or graduates. Apply careful discretion and deliberation before destroying sole-possession records that may be needed by a court of law such as notes on child abuse, suicide, sexual harassment or violence.
e. Understand and abide by the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA, 1974), which safeguards student’s records and allows parents to have a voice in what and how information is shared with others regarding their child’s educational records.
A.9. Evaluation, Assessment and Interpretation
Professional school counselors:
a. Adhere to all professional standards regarding selecting, administering and interpreting assessment measures and only utilize assessment measures that are within the scope of practice for school counselors and for which they are trained and competent.
b. Consider confidentiality issues when utilizing evaluative or assessment instruments and electronically based programs.
c. Consider the developmental age, language skills and level of competence of the student taking the assessments before assessments are given.
d. Provide interpretation of the nature, purposes, results and potential impact of assessment/evaluation measures in language the students can understand.
e. Monitor the use of assessment results and interpretations, and take reasonable steps to prevent others from misusing the information.
f. Use caution when utilizing assessment techniques, making evaluations and interpreting the performance of populations not represented in the norm group on which an instrument is standardized.
g. Assess the effectiveness of their program in having an impact on students’ academic, career and personal/social development through accountability measures especially examining efforts to close achievement, opportunity and attainment gaps.
Professional school counselors:
a. Promote the benefits of and clarify the limitations of various appropriate technological applications. Professional school counselors promote technological applications (1) that are appropriate for students’ individual needs, (2) that students understand how to use and (3) for which follow-up counseling assistance is provided.
b. Advocate for equal access to technology for all students, especially those historically underserved.
c. Take appropriate and reasonable measures for maintaining confidentiality of student information and educational records stored or
transmitted through the use of computers, facsimile machines, telephones, voicemail, answering machines and other electronic or computer technology.
d. Understand the intent of FERPA and its impact on sharing electronic student records.
e. Consider the extent to which cyberbullying is interfering with students’ educational process and base guidance curriculum and intervention programming for this pervasive and potentially dangerous problem on research-based and best practices.
A.11. Student Peer Support Program
Professional school counselors:
a. Have unique responsibilities when working with peer-helper or student-assistance programs and safeguard the welfare of students participating in peer-to-peer programs under their direction.
b. Are ultimately responsible for appropriate training and supervision for students serving as peer-support individuals in their school counseling programs.
B. Responsibilities to Parents/Guardians
B.1. Parents Rights and Responsibilities
Professional school counselors:
a. Respect the rights and responsibilities of parents/guardians for their children and endeavor to establish, as appropriate, a collaborative relationship with parents/guardians to facilitate students’ maximum development.
b. Adhere to laws, local guidelines and ethical standards of practice when assisting parents/guardians experiencing family difficulties interfering with the student’s effectiveness and welfare.
c. Are sensitive to diversity among families and recognize that all parents/guardians, custodial and noncustodial, are vested with certain rights and responsibilities for their children’s welfare by virtue of their role and according to law.
d. Inform parents of the nature of counseling services provided in the school setting.
e. Adhere to the FERPA act regarding disclosure of student information.
f. Work to establish, as appropriate, collaborative relationships with parents/guardians to best serve student.
B.2. Parents/Guardians and Confidentiality
Professional school counselors:
a. Inform parents/guardians of the school counselor’s role to include the confidential nature of the counseling relationship between the counselor and student.
b. Recognize that working with minors in a school setting requires school counselors to collaborate with students’ parents/guardians to the extent possible.
c. Respect the confidentiality of parents/guardians to the extent that is reasonable to protect the best interest of the student being counseled.
d. Provide parents/guardians with accurate, comprehensive and relevant information in an objective and caring manner, as is appropriate and consistent with ethical responsibilities to the student.
e. Make reasonable efforts to honor the wishes of parents/guardians concerning information regarding the student unless a court order expressly forbids the involvement of a parent(s). In cases of divorce or separation, school counselors exercise a good-faith effort to keep both parents informed, maintaining focus on the student and avoiding supporting one parent over another in divorce proceedings.
C. Responsibilities to Colleagues and Professional Associates
C.1. Professional Relationships
Professional school counselors, the school counseling program director/site supervisor and the school counselor educator:
a. Establish and maintain professional relationships with faculty, staff and administration to facilitate an optimum counseling program.
b. Treat colleagues with professional respect, courtesy and fairness.
c. Recognize that teachers, staff and administrators who are highfunctioning in the personal and social development skills can be powerful allies in supporting student success. School counselors work to develop relationships with all faculty and staff in order to advantage students.
d. Are aware of and utilize related professionals, organizations and other resources to whom the student may be referred.
C.2. Sharing Information with Other Professionals
Professional school counselors:
a. Promote awareness and adherence to appropriate guidelines regarding confidentiality, the distinction between public and private
information and staff consultation.
b. Provide professional personnel with accurate, objective, concise and meaningful data necessary to adequately evaluate, counsel and assist the student.
c. Secure parental consent and develop clear agreements with other mental health professionals when a student is receiving services from another counselor or other mental health professional in order to avoid confusion and conflict for the student and parents/guardians.
d. Understand about the “release of information” process and parental rights in sharing information and attempt to establish a
cooperative and collaborative relationship with other professionals to benefit students.
e. Recognize the powerful role of ally that faculty and administration who function high in personal/social development skills can play in supporting students in stress, and carefully filter confidential information to give these allies what they “need to know” in order
to advantage the student. Consultation with other members of the school counseling profession is helpful in determining need-to-know information. The primary focus and obligation is always on the student when it comes to sharing confidential information.
f. Keep appropriate records regarding individual students, and develop a plan for transferring those records to another professional school counselor should the need occur. This documentation transfer will protect the confidentiality and benefit the needs of the student for whom the records are written.
C.3. Collaborating and Educating Around the Role of the School Counselor
The school counselor, school counseling program supervisor/ director and school counselor educator:
a. Share the role of the school counseling program in ensuring datadriven academic, career/college and personal/social success competencies for every student, resulting in specific outcomes/indicators with all stakeholders.
b. Broker services internal and external to the schools to help ensure every student receives the benefits of a school counseling program and specific academic, career/college and personal/social competencies.
D. Responsibilities to the School and Community
D.1. Responsibility to the School
Professional school counselors:
a. Support and protect students’ best interest against any infringement of their educational program.
b. Inform appropriate officials, in accordance with school policy, of conditions that may be potentially disruptive or damaging to the school’s mission, personnel and property while honoring the confidentiality between the student and the school counselor.
c. Are knowledgeable and supportive of their school’s mission, and connect their program to the school’s mission.
d. Delineate and promote the school counselor’s role, and function as a student advocate in meeting the needs of those served. School counselors will notify appropriate officials of systemic conditions that may limit or curtail their effectiveness in providing programs and services.
e. Accept employment only for positions for which they are qualified by education, training, supervised experience, state and national professional credentials and appropriate professional experience.
f. Advocate that administrators hire only qualified, appropriately trained and competent individuals for professional school counseling
positions.
g. Assist in developing: (1) curricular and environmental conditions appropriate for the school and community; (2) educational procedures and programs to meet students’ developmental needs; (3) a systematic evaluation process for comprehensive, developmental, standards-based school counseling programs, services and personnel; and (4) a data-driven evaluation process guiding the comprehensive, developmental school counseling program and service delivery.
D.2. Responsibility to the Community
Professional school counselors:
a. Collaborate with community agencies, organizations and individuals in students’ best interest and without regard to personal reward or remuneration.
b. Extend their influence and opportunity to deliver a comprehensive school counseling program to all students by collaborating with community resources for student success.
c. Promote equity for all students through community resources.
d. Are careful not to use their professional role as a school counselor to benefit any type of private therapeutic or consultative practice in which they might be involved outside of the school setting.
E. Responsibility to Self
Professional school counselors:
a. Function within the boundaries of individual professional competence and accept responsibility for the consequences of their actions.
b. Monitor emotional and physical health and practice wellness to ensure optimal effectiveness. Seek physical or mental health referrals when needed to ensure competence at all times
c. Monitor personal responsibility and recognize the high standard of care a professional in this critical position of trust must maintain on and off the job and are cognizant of and refrain from activity that may lead to inadequate professional services or diminish their effectiveness with school community members Professional and personal growth are ongoing throughout the counselor’s career.
d. Strive through personal initiative to stay abreast of current research and to maintain professional competence in advocacy, teaming and collaboration, culturally competent counseling and school counseling program coordination, knowledge and use of technology, leadership, and equity assessment using data.
e. Ensure a variety of regular opportunities for participating in and facilitating professional development for self and other educators
and school counselors through continuing education opportunities annually including: attendance at professional school counseling
conferences; reading Professional School Counseling journal articles; facilitating workshops for education staff on issues school counselors are uniquely positioned to provide.
f. Enhance personal self-awareness, professional effectiveness and ethical practice by regularly attending presentations on ethical decision-making. Effective school counselors will seek supervision when ethical or professional questions arise in their practice.
g. Maintain current membership in professional associations to ensure ethical and best practices.
Professional school counselors:
a. Monitor and expand personal multicultural and social justice advocacy awareness, knowledge and skills. School counselors strive for exemplary cultural competence by ensuring personal beliefs or values are not imposed on students or other stakeholders.
b. Develop competencies in how prejudice, power and various forms of oppression, such as ableism, ageism, classism, familyism, genderism, heterosexism, immigrationism, linguicism, racism, religionism and sexism, affect self, students and all stakeholders.
c. Acquire educational, consultation and training experiences to improve awareness, knowledge, skills and effectiveness in working
with diverse populations: ethnic/racial status, age, economic status, special needs, ESL or ELL, immigration status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity/expression, family type, religious/spiritual identity and appearance.
d. Affirm the multiple cultural and linguistic identities of every student and all stakeholders. Advocate for equitable school and school counseling program policies and practices for every student and all stakeholders including use of translators and bilingual/ multilingual school counseling program materials that represent all languages used by families in the school community, and advocate for appropriate accommodations and accessibility for students with disabilities.
e. Use inclusive and culturally responsible language in all forms of communication.
f. Provide regular workshops and written/digital information to families to increase understanding, collaborative two-way communication and a welcoming school climate between families and the school to promote increased student achievement.
g. Work as advocates and leaders in the school to create equitybased school counseling programs that help close any achievement,
opportunity and attainment gaps that deny all students the chance to pursue their educational goals.
F. Responsibility to the Profession
Professional school counselors:
a. Accept the policies and procedures for handling ethical violations as a result of maintaining membership in the American
School Counselor Association.
b. Conduct themselves in such a manner as to advance individual ethical practice and the profession.
c. Conduct appropriate research, and report findings in a manner consistent with acceptable educational and psychological research
practices. School counselors advocate for the protection of individual students’ identities when using data for research or program
planning.
d. Seek institutional and parent/guardian consent before administering any research, and maintain security of research records.
e. Adhere to ethical standards of the profession, other official policy statements, such as ASCA’s position statements, role statement and the ASCA National Model and relevant statutes established by federal, state and local governments, and when these are in conflict work responsibly for change.
f. Clearly distinguish between statements and actions made as a private individual and those made as a representative of the school
counseling profession.
g. Do not use their professional position to recruit or gain clients, consultees for their private practice or to seek and receive unjustified
personal gains, unfair advantage, inappropriate relationships or unearned goods or services.
F.2. Contribution to the Profession
Professional school counselors:
a. Actively participate in professional associations and share results and best practices in assessing, implementing and annually evaluating the outcomes of data-driven school counseling programs with measurable academic, career/college and personal/social competencies for every student.
b. Provide support, consultation and mentoring to novice professionals.
c. Have a responsibility to read and abide by the ASCA Ethical Standards and adhere to the applicable laws and regulations.
F.3. Supervision of School Counselor Candidates Pursuing Practicum and Internship Experiences
Professional school counselors:
a. Provide support for appropriate experiences in academic, career, college access and personal/social counseling for school counseling interns.
b. Ensure school counselor candidates have experience in developing, implementing and evaluating a data-driven school counseling program model, such as the ASCA National Model.
c. Ensure the school counseling practicum and internship have specific, measurable service delivery, foundation, management and accountability systems.
d. Ensure school counselor candidates maintain appropriate liability insurance for the duration of the school counseling practicum and internship experiences.
e. Ensure a site visit is completed by a school counselor education faculty member for each practicum or internship student, preferably when both the school counselor trainee and site supervisor are
present.
F.4 Collaboration and Education about School Counselors and School Counseling Programs with other Professionals
School counselors and school counseling program directors/supervisors collaborate with special educators, school nurses,
school social workers, school psychologists, college counselors/admissions officers, physical therapists, occupational therapists and speech pathologists to advocate for optimal services for students and all other stakeholders.
Professional school counselors are expected to maintain ethical behavior at all times.
G.1 When there exists serious doubts as to the ethical behavior of a colleague(s) the following procedure may serve as a guide:
1. The school counselor should consult confidentially with a professional colleague to discuss the nature of a complaint to see if the professional colleague views the situation as an ethical violation.
2. When feasible, the school counselor should directly approach the colleague whose behavior is in question to discuss the complaint and seek resolution.
3. The school counselor should keep documentation of all the steps taken.
4. If resolution is not forthcoming at the personal level, the school counselor shall utilize the channels established within the school,
school district, the state school counseling association and ASCA’s Ethics Committee.
5. If the matter still remains unresolved, referral for review and appropriate action should be made to the Ethics Committees in the following sequence:
• State school counselor association
• American School Counselor Association
6. The ASCA Ethics Committee is responsible for:
• Educating and consulting with the membership regarding ethical
standards
• Periodically reviewing and recommending changes in code
• Receiving and processing questions to clarify the application
of such standards. Questions must be submitted in writing to
the ASCA Ethics Committee chair.
• Handling complaints of alleged violations of the ASCA Ethical
Standards for School Counselors. At the national level, complaints
should be submitted in writing to the ASCA Ethics
Committee, c/o the Executive Director, American School
Counselor Association, 1101 King St., Suite 625, Alexandria,
VA 22314.
G.2 When School Counselors are forced to work in situations or abide by policies that do not reflect the ethics of the profession, the school counselor works responsibly through the correct channels to try and remedy the condition.
G.3 When faced with any ethical dilemma, school counselors, school counseling program director/supervisors and school counselor educators use an ethical decision-making model such as Solutions to Ethical Problems in Schools (STEPS) (Stone 2001):
1. Define the problem emotionally and intellectually
2. Apply the ASCA Ethical Standards and the law
3. Consider the students’ chronological and developmental levels
4. Consider the setting, parental rights and minors’ rights
5. Apply the moral principles
6. Determine Your potential courses of action and their
consequences
7. Evaluate the selected action
8. Consult
9. Implement the course of action
For a downloadable and printable version of the above-mentioned ASCA Code of Ethics, please click here.
