Enhancing Counseling Services for International Students

Abstract

Designing counseling services requires counselors to consider the emerging needs of international students at various stages of cross-cultural transition. Students have specific needs during the transition of entering the new culture as they begin their academic program and face new situations and new ways of interacting. As international students master early demands and learn about the local culture, their counseling issues also change in focus. Likewise, as students begin to prepare for leaving the host country and returning home, the nature of the issues that are relevant for counseling are often related to re-entry. Counseling services need to take into consideration the shifting concerns of international students and consider how their services can be organized to be responsive. This requires counselors to move “beyond narrowly defined methods and contexts” (Pedersen, 1991, p. 29) and take a dynamic approach to the design and delivery of counseling services.