Cultural Competency: A Lesson Learned

I remember quite a few years ago I was speaking with another teacher and I said something about an "Oriental" person and she said, "Debbie, home decor is oriental. People are Asian!" Here I was a teacher, considering myself fair and tolerant, and I was relying on an out-dated term for my very own students. I learned a simple phrase-change that day, but I also learned a great lesson: what you THINK about yourself and what is actual FACT about yourself must match. How does a person keep those two things in line? One must LISTEN more than you TALK (remember, I talk for a living, so this is hard for me!) and embrace the philosophy of being a life-long learner. There are many ways, in addition to listening, to learn about the cultures of the clients you serve. Reading current research in which various cultures are studied is one source. Workshops and seminars are effective. As a teacher I have been able to befriend many adults and students from various cultures, and as I spend time with them they have shown me about their world-view as I in turn shared my American culture. The actual assimilation of various culture norms is more closely aligned to cooking in a crock-pot than a blender. We live in a culturally diverse society, and a counselor's ethical mandate is to be prepared to provide services for anyone within that society. Embracing this fact is the major first step toward sucess.

The web-site below is for the National Center for Cultural Competence. It provides a lot of information as well as resources for the life-long learner desiring to achieve Cultural Competence as a School Counselor.

http://www11.georgetown.edu/research/gucchd/nccc/