Access Type

Open Access Dissertation

Date of Award

January 2014

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Department

Counselor Education

First Advisor

JoAnne Holbert

Abstract

The present study examined bilingual counseling in a localized setting: a high school in southwest Detroit. The study assessed the ways in which bilingual counseling increases effective communication among bilingual students, school personnel, and students' parents/guardians. Participants included a cross-section of educators and support staff who work at a high school in southwest Detroit where the student population is predominately Spanish/English bilingual. Questionnaires were distributed to 81 participants; 59 completed questionnaires were returned. The instrument that was used to collect data was a questionnaire, which consisted of 19 questions. The questions reflected the participants' attitudes with respect to the research question: Does bilingual counseling increase effective communication among high school bilingual Latino students, school personnel, and students' parents/guardians in southwest Detroit? Cronbach alpha was used to determine the reliability of items 3-19. The result, .982, indicated a very high level in homogeneity of item content and, therefore, very strong evidence of reliability. A t-test was conducted to determine if there was a statistically significant difference between student vs. parents on lack of English. The result was not statistically significant. The nonparametric Mann-Whitney test was also conducted. Here, too, the results were not statistically significant. For items 1 and 2, with a range of 0 - 1, the mean scores were .66 and .77 respectively. Summary items statistics compiled an item means for questionnaire items 3 - 19. On a scale of 1 = low and 5 = high, the mean for all 17 items was 4.17, indicating that the participants found the bilingual counselor to be helpful. Implications of the study and recommendations for future research were also discussed.

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