Publication Date

Spring 2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Department

Counselor Education

First Advisor

Dr. Leonis Wright

Second Advisor

Dr. Daniel Koonce

Third Advisor

Dr. Patricia Robey

Abstract

The number of immigrants coming to the United States has tripled since the 1970s (Budiman, 2020). Due to various global and international factors, the numbers of immigrants arriving to the United States continues to increase yearly (Ward and Batalova, 2023). Of the 45+ million immigrants currently in the United States, more than 11 million are undocumented (Budiman, 2020; Chhabra et al., 2023). Research has found that being an undocumented immigrant in the United States comes with many additional challenges and limitations including financial, health, educational, and legal barriers (Allweiss & Hilado, 2018; Capps et al., 2013; Chhabra et al., 2023; Garcini et al., 2016; Garcini et al., 2018; Garcini et al., 2021; Hacker et al., 2015; Logan et al., 2021; Yakushoko, 2009). With more than a quarter of the United States' population being impacted by immigration and mental health implications as a result, it deems essential that counseling professionals receive evidence-based and culturally responsive training to support the mental health and wellness needs of the immigrant and undocumented immigrant communities. This study utilized a quasi-experimental methodology by which counselors were assessed on their multicultural and social justice counseling competencies and ethnic tolerance towards immigrants, then received a 3-hour training on best practices for counseling the undocumented immigrant community. The posttest results of the study showed the training positively influenced scores on multicultural and social justice counseling competence scores and ethnic tolerance.

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