Beyond Discipline-Based Expertise: Preparing Global Leaders in Rehabilitation

Abstract -Graduate education for rehabilitation counselors should now go beyond discipline-based expertise to the point of preparing global leaders in rehabilitation. The world is becoming increasingly small due to technology, as we rapidly approach the reality of that proverbial global village. Rehabilitation counselors can expand their base of influence, and thus, importance by functioning in a global context. To accomplish this, it is necessary to go beyond the typical preparation of rehabilitation counselors to integrate seven new skills into graduate rehabilitation counselor education. The skills are intercultural competency, anticipating the future, making organizations learning entities, using a comprehensive framework for planning change, data-driven decision making, critical thinking, and transformational leadership. An overview of each of these skills is provided along with strategies for infusing the skills immediately into Council on Rehabilitation Education-accredited graduate rehabilitation programs. There is also value in mainstreaming the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) framework and including training in developing social capital as additional complementary elements in preparing global leaders in rehabilitation.Keywords: rehabilitation education, counselor training, skills, global leadersThis discussion addresses the development of global leaders in rehabilitation counseling. The world is becoming increasingly small everyday due to technology, so it would be prudent for the profession of rehabilitation counseling to demonstrate its relevance in a global manner. This would broaden the base of influence of the profession and firm up the importance of rehabilitation counseling on a worldwide basis. Preparing global leaders in rehabilitation at this point in the new century must extend beyond the discipline-based expertise that has been a mainstay tradition in the formal training of rehabilitation professionals for decades. Therefore, this discussion promotes the integration of several, new, cross-cutting skills that if embraced by rehabilitation counselors will render them global leaders in the 21st century. Those skills are described as well as strategies to integrate them into existing curricula of accredited graduate rehabilitation counseling programs.Formal training of rehabilitation counseling professionals began with the passage of the Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1954 (Public Law 565) that established university based education programs over a half century ago. Rehabilitation counselors (RCs) work with individuals with disabilities in a variety of settings with the goal of assisting them to develop and reach goals that focus on personal, career, and independent living success (Commission on Rehabilitation Counselor Certification [CRCC], 2012). In order to successfully fulfill these aims, RCs must develop necessary knowledge and skills to perform a variety of job functions.The CRCC, the body that certifies RCs in the United States and Canada, has identified the following ten knowledge domains that RCs must be competent in to gain certification: 1) assessment, appraisal, and vocational evaluation, 2) job development, job placement, career and lifestyle development, 3) vocational consultation and services for employers, 4) case management, professional roles and practices, and utilization of community resources, 5) foundations of counseling, professional orientation and ethical practice, theories, social and cultural issues, and human growth and development, 6) group and family counseling, 7) mental health counseling, 8) medical, functional, and psychosocial aspects of disability, 9) disability management, and 10) research, program evaluation, and evidence-based practice (2013). Furthermore, a study of Certified Rehabilitation Counselors (CRCs) by Leahy, Chan, and Saunders (2003) found that CRCs identified the following job functions as important: vocational counseling and consultation, counseling interventions, communitybased rehabilitation services, case management, applied research, assessment, and professional advocacy. …