The CACREP-accredited counseling programs’ multicultural environment, counseling students’ multicultural counseling competence, and social justice advocacy

Counseling programs are obligated to provide their students with a multicultural environment, which in theory is known to foster counseling students' learning and growth as culturally sensitive and socially responsive professionals. However, there has been a paucity of studies addressing the multicultural environment of counseling programs and its impact on students’ professional development. Therefore, as a response to the gap, this study aimed to explore (1) the current status of counseling programs’ multicultural environment, (2) the relationship of counseling programs' multicultural environment with multicultural counseling competence and (3) with social justice advocacy, and (4) the moderating effect of perceived oppression in regard to cultural identities on the aforementioned relationships. Also, a subsequent analysis was performed to investigate the mediating role of social justice advocacy between multicultural environment and multicultural counseling competence.

One hundred forty-six graduate students enrolled in CACREP-accredited counseling programs participated in this study. The results indicate that programs' multicultural environment significantly predicts multicultural counseling competence after controlling social desirability, and social justice advocacy. Among the perceived oppression in regard to self-reported cultural identities, only sexual orientation was found to moderate the relationship between multicultural environment and multicultural counseling competence. Lastly, a post-hoc path analysis found a statistically significant relationship between multicultural environment and multicultural counseling competence mediated by social justice advocacy.

Interpretations of these results and relevant implications for counseling programs, counselor educators, and researchers were discussed.