MCT Toolkit Handout
MCT Toolkit Handout
Multicultural counseling and therapy is both a helping role and a process. It is a way of being as well as a way of doing. It is a fusion of awareness, knowledge, and skills that when applied in combination with a social justice orientation, dramatically enhances the helping professionals ability to engage in actions and develop interventions that respect the values, preferences, and worldviews of their culturally diverse clients. There is no endpoint for MCT, it is a practice that requires consistent care, reflection, and attention from the helping professional on an ongoing basis.
MCT is a lifelong process that requires you to work actively to:
Grow Your Awareness - of your own identity(ies), socialization, worldview, values, biases, limitations, preconceived notions, and assumptions about human behaviorAccumulate More Knowledge - of the variance that exists in the worldviews of culturally diverse groups and the sociohistorical context that informs how they experience the counseling relationshipDevelop More Skills - to deliver appropriate, relevant, and sensitive interventions in a manner that communicates respect and appreciation for the cultural context in which clients existIn order to remain active in these pursuits, it is crucial for you to have a collection of experiences, practices, resources, and growth oriented processes that you can come back to along your MCT journey. This is where your MCT Toolkit comes into play.
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MCT
Step 1: Refer back to Steps 3 and 4 of the Self-Assessment of Cultural Comfort Handout you completed in Week 2. Identify the 3 SIC markers that you ranked as the least comfortable for you to engage in conversation around:
Step 2: Identify which of the lifelong processes would be most impactful in preparing you to engage in effective MCT with clients who identify with the disprivileged identities associated with each of the 3 SIC markers you identified above.
SIC Category Privileged Identity(ies) Disprivileged Identity(ies) Impactful Lifelong Processes for My Professional Practice
Step 3: Round out your MCT toolkit by identifying three resources for each of the lifelong processes that were outlined above: growing your awareness; accumulating more knowledge; and developing more skills. Some of these things may be resources you have found through this class, but ideally you will look beyond the course content to find additional resources that exist to support growth, development, and earnest self-reflection for MCT helping professionals.
At least one of the resources for each of the 3 lifelong processes should address one of the 3 SIC markers that you ranked as the least comfortable for you to engage in conversation around in Step 1.
Resources for Growing My Awareness:
First resource addresses one of the 3 SIC markers that I ranked as the least comfortable for me to engage in conversation around
Resources for Accumulating More Knowledge:
First resource addresses one of the 3 SIC markers that I ranked as the least comfortable for me to engage in conversation around
Resources for Developing More Skills:
First resource addresses one of the 3 SIC markers that I ranked as the least comfortable for me to engage in conversation around
Remember, there is no endpoint for MCT but there is an endpoint for this class. If you allow your learning to stop here, you will be doing yourself, and most importantly your culturally diverse clients, a disservice. MCT best practices will continue to evolve and MCT counselors will be instrumental in ensuring that social justice and multicultural competence are truly superordinate to counseling competence.
Step 4: Draft a letter to your future clients that outlines your commitment to grounding your work as a helping professional in the principles of social justice and MCT. Use this letter to share why this work is important to you, how this work will grow you as a counselor and enhance the outcomes of your culturally diverse clients, and how you plan to stay true to this commitment.
Dear future clients:
