High School Graduates’ Perceptions of Their Former School Counselors’ Effectiveness in Promoting Students’ College Knowledge

Although career development is often seen as the purview of school counselors, research suggests that many students do not have a favorable impression of school counselors’ effectiveness in promoting students’ career development. The purpose of this study was to identify factors regarding the perceptions of school counselors’ effectiveness in promoting students’ college readiness, along with knowledge from college students who recently graduated from high school. Furthermore, the study sought to determine whether students’ individual characteristics (e.g., race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, etc.) and ecological characteristics of the high school they attended (e.g., size of high school, region of the country), or the frequency or context of meeting with their school counselor, served as predictors of the factors of participants’ perceptions of their school counselor in promoting students’ college readiness and knowledge. The perceptions of college students who recently graduated from high school regarding the effectiveness of school counselors in promoting students’ college readiness and knowledge yielded two factors. One factor concerned providing students with a broad exposure to the college environment. The other factor involved school counselors assisting students with completing specific steps for pursuing college enrollment. We found that as the frequency with which recent high graduates reported meeting with their school counselor increased, favorable perceptions they had of the school counselors’ effectiveness in both exposing students to the college environment and assisting them with completing the specific steps in pursuing college enrolment also increased.