Sifting Through the Sand: Utilizing Sandtray as an Intervention for Career Development in Counselor Education

Increasing research demonstrates the positive impact of expressive arts in the counseling process. However, there is an evident disconnect across mental health fields in best practices for implementing expressive arts as interventions. As such, sandtray therapy can be an effective modality for facilitating career decision-making through the use of symbols and miniatures as a representation of career goals, identifying barriers and providing available resources to clinicians and clients. The purpose of this phenomenological study is to examine the impact of using sandtray as a tool for personal and clinical growth for novice clinicians in counseling related fields. The research questions focus on the impact of the intervention on the participants pursuing a graduate degree in mental health counseling or independent licensure. While sandtray has been used as an intervention with various populations across the lifespan, no literature was found utilizing sandtray as an intervention for career development in master’s or doctoral counseling or psychology students. This study is intended to supplement traditional methods of career counseling, particularly within counselor education, for novice clinicians.