Southeastern professor authors book on school counseling

Press Release Date: 03-25-2010

DURANT, Okla. ­ Dr. Reba J. Criswell, Assistant Professor and School Counseling Program Coordinator in the Department of Behavioral Sciences at Southeastern Oklahoma State University, is the author of a new book which is now available on Amazon.

The book is entitled School Counselors With and Without Teaching Experience:

A Comprehensive Overview and Comparative Analysis, and examines several areas of school counseling practice, in particular the delivery of counseling services adopted by the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) and certification requirements for school counselors.

Criswell stated, "Certification requirements for school counselors are changing across the nation to exclude teaching experience. With this shift in certification requirements, I believed in the importance of gathering as much information as possible to help educators stay abreast of current school counseling practices."

In her book, Criswell included the results of a comprehensive study in which she compared teachers’ opinions of the effectiveness of school counselors with and without teaching experience. As teachers have more contact with students than any other school personnel, their opinions of school counselor effectiveness are of great importance.

Criswell has taught graduate counseling courses in the Master of Education School Counseling Degree Program for the past 10 years.

She is a member of the American Counseling Association and the American School Counselor Association as well as a number of state counseling associations.

Criswell serves as a faculty liaison to public schools in southeastern Oklahoma and northern Texas.