Assignments

The purpose of the learning plan is to support your continuing competency development of the professional writing and APA standards of the GCAP program. In GCAP 631 and 633, we include these pass/fail requirements as well as a review of professional writing and APA standards within the course assignments to ensure you have a strong grasp of these skills by the end of your first year in the program. You may want to review Collins (2020), Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines, as well as the 7^th edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.

Eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

By the end of the first week of this course, you are required to submit a revision of your learning plan for your professional writing goals. You started your learning plan after the orientation and revisited it at the end of GCAP 631, based on both your progress as a professional writer and emergent issues you encountered through feedback on your course assignments. This might be a good time to revisit the checklists in Sections 6.1 and 6.2 of Collins (2020), Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines, noting any issues that you think still need further attention. Please follow the outline below to update your learning plan.

Specific goals or outcomes	Actions you will take to achieve the desired goal or outcome	Resources required to support each action	Time frame for each action	Indicators of success

Your revised learning plan should include 3–4 specific goals or outcomes, analyzed in the table format above, and use a maximum of 600 words. It does not have to be in APA format. There is no TA in this course to provide coaching related to professional writing; however, you are invited to consult with the instructor and to solicit specific feedback in writing areas you are struggling with throughout the course. The purpose of the Learning Plan is to keep you focused on your competency development and to give the instructor a heads up on the areas with which you are struggling and on which might want specific feedback.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

At the end of Week 13 of the course, you are required to submit a brief summary of your evolving proficiency with professional writing and APA skills. Please take into account the feedback you received on GCAP 633 course assignments. Highlight your emerging strengths and the areas in which you are still working. Focus this version of the learning plan on how you plan to support your progress as you continue through the program. Be very specific in identifying 2–3 strategies you will use to make sure you do not lose sight of professional writing as an ongoing and important part of your professional development. Part II of your learning plan should be a maximum of 400 words and does not have to be in paragraph form or APA format.

We have supported, and put a lot of emphasis on, your incremental learning of these competencies in the program orientation, GCAP 631, and GCAP 633. In GCAP 691, you will be evaluated explicitly on your proficiency with these transdisciplinary program outcomes in the Literature Review assignment for that course. So, please continue to work on any areas of weakness over the summer months. You may also want to review Collins (2020), Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines, paying particular attention to Section 4, Developing a Writing Plan: Critical Deconstruction, and to Section 5, Drafting Your Paper: Critical Reconstruction, because you will revisit this content in 691 as a foundation for writing your literature review.

NOTE: This content is NOT part of GCAP 633 assignments, although it may provide some guidance in terms of continued competency development for Part II of your Learning Plan. The content below is excerpted from the literature review instructions in GCAP 691 to give you a better sense of what is required so you can plan ahead for that course. More complete instructions are provided in GCAP 691.

Choose a topic within the fields of counselling and psychology. Then glean what is already out there in the literature, and develop your own ideas on the topic. Start by critically analyzing at least 15 peer-reviewed journal articles on your topic (7 must be research studies, and all must be either recent or seminal articles). You will be graded on your appropriate selection of sources.
Organize the content from these articles in a meaningful way. Try to develop a system that will allow you to see the interconnections across articles as well as the gaps within and between them.
Create an original problem statement as the central thread for your writing. Then delineate a clear set of arguments (typically 5‒8) to form the foundation of your literature review.
Demonstrate awareness of professional ethics and respect for cultural diversity and social justice in your problem statement and arguments. Professional writing is evaluated on both the quality of the argument and the nature of the argument, which must fit within the values of the profession.
Flesh out your argument(s) by integrating, synthesizing, citing, and critiquing the literature you reviewed.
Ensure that you provide appropriate citations for all of the ideas you pull from the literature, and support all of your ideas with appropriate references to the professional literature.
Define and discuss any major concepts or theoretical frameworks you reference.
Draft an introduction and a conclusion, ensuring that your problem statement is clear and that you contextualize it within the existing literature. The conclusion should reference your objective in researching the topic area.

The primary purpose of the Learning Plan is to encourage your continued focus on professional writing competency development. The Learning Plan, Parts I and II, will be evaluated on a pass/fail basis. Your instructor will base their assessment on (a) the clarity of the learning plan, (b) the links between the learning plan and the professional writing and APA competencies targeted in the GCAP program, and (c) evidence of commitment to become proficient with these competencies.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Throughout the course, you are required to complete a Risk-Taking Journal. You will also engage in one mandatory and one optional one-to-one conversation with your course instructor at different points in the semester. Affective (i.e., emotional) learning and attitudinal change are specifically targeted through the Risk-Taking Journal, because this is intended as a space for you to set personal and professional competency development goals, to process your emotional reactions to the course materials, to lean into areas of discomfort or unfamiliarity, and to step outside your comfort zones. Lawrence, Foster, and Teiso (2015) wrote about Creating creative clinicians: Incorporating creativity into counselor education. They argued that risk-taking forms the foundation for creativity, which in turn, fosters counsellor responsivity to clients and the ability to support creative problem-solving in collaboration with clients.

Assignment Description

Writing and Technical Tips

Step 1 Create your blog

The Risk-taking Journal has been set up as a personal blog, accessible only to you and the course instructor, in which you will record your responses to specific questions posed each week. You are encouraged to use this also as a place to reflect critically on other concepts, issues, or interactions that are significant or meaningful to you throughout the course.

Each week, up to and including Week 10, you will be asked to respond to 1‒2. You will find the questions or prompts to start off your weekly blog entries posted within each week of the course in Moodle. These will not be visible until the first day of the week. The total number of required blog words in any week is 250 words (regardless of the number of questions or prompts); however, you may write more if you choose. You may meet the word requirement through a series of short entries, or through one longer entry. Either way, your entry(ies) must be posted by the last day of the week. You may not go back at a later date to fill in missed weeks.

Your journal entries will not be individually graded by the instructor; however, the instructor will access your journal to see that you have responded to the prompts or questions provided throughout the semester and to get a general sense of your level of critical engagement with the assignment.

Step 2 Welcome mentorship

Your instructor will invite you to meet for a one-on-one conversation during either Week 6 or 7. The instructor decides what medium to use (i.e., videoconference, telephone) and plans for 20 minutes per session. The purpose of this dialogue is to provide individualized support and coaching related to the areas in which you are most challenged or uncomfortable in the course. This consultation is integral to the grading of this assignment, so you must come prepared to the conversation. Watch for a post from the instructor early in the course about how to sign up for times to connect. You have the option to book a second conversation with the instructor in Week 11.

Prior to the first conversation (Tuesday Week 5), you are required to submit to the assignment dropbox a 1–2 page, double-spaced response to Reflections 1 (below), drawing on ideas from your Risk-Taking Journal about which you want to talk. Your submission does not have to be in paragraph form or APA format. You are expected to demonstrate the metacognitive skills of personal reflection, critical thinking, and cognitive complexity as you focus on your thoughts and feelings related to the Risk-taking Journal questions or prompts. Highlight one or more of the key themes as a starting point for the conversation. These themes are tailored to the points in the course at which the conversation(s) take place and to the evaluation criteria for the assignment. You have the option to sign up for a second conversation (15 minutes) in Week 11. If you choose not to sign up for a second conversation in Week 11, you must submit Reflections 2 to the assignment dropbox on Tuesday Week 10.

The main goal of the conversations is to offer mentorship in the areas you are finding most challenging, so your submission should be primarily learner-driven. Please also feel free to raise points of disagreement or critiques related to the course materials.

Reflections 1

Inseparability of client and counsellor cultural identities from the counselling process,
subjectivity and sociocultural construction of knowledge and experience,
mandate to respect the dignity of all persons and peoples,
risks of dignitary harm through ethnocentrism and cultural biases,
personal and professional accountability for social injustice and inequity, or
social justice as a core professional value.

Reflections 2

Tensions and expectations related to professional identity development,
inseparability of the personal and the professional
values-based nature of counselling,
anti-oppressive and justice-doing professional stances, or
call to engagement in systems level change.

Although this submission does not require APA formatting, please attend to basic writing standards (e.g., sentence structure, font size, spelling, and grammar) to ensure readability.

Graduate writing, and this assignment in particular, require you to develop you own voice and to write in a way that conforms to professional standards. You are encouraged to review Section 1.3, Developing Your Voice, in Collins (2020), Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines.

IMPORTANT: Your blog is set for your instructor to have access to your entries. Please do not write anything in your blog that you would not want the instructor to read.

How to add a blog

Access your blog in Moodle (see the Risk-taking Journal Blog under the Assignments section).
To add a blog entry, click on the Risk-taking Journal Blog link, then click on the New blog post button. You will be taken to the standard screen for entering information. Compose each entry into the blog as a message, similar to a discussion forum post. Click on the Add blog post button at the bottom to save your changes.
If you wish to view the entries you have created, chose your name from the drop box in the Visible individual field. You can edit or delete your blog entries using the buttons on the lower right corner of the blog entry area.

Tags

Tags are short words or phrases that help identify the content included in an online post, similar to the subject line of an email. Each blog entry can have one or more tags applied to it.
We recommend that you enter the section of your course, GCAP633Students (instructor name), as a tag in all of your entries. If you use blogs in more than one course, you will later be able to search the blog by course using this tag.
Optional: Feel free to add additional tags if you like. User-defined tags allow you to make up your own tags. A tag you create can be used by any student in the course, but only you can edit or delete your user-defined tag.

The assessment criteria for the Assignment 1 Risk-Taking Journal are listed below. Please pay careful attention to the rubric as you complete your assignment to ensure that you demonstrate the level of learning you personally want to attain through this assignment. Specific descriptors are provided for each level of performance within each of the assessment criteria for the assignment. The expectations for the assignment are best reflected by the descriptors in the B+ to A- range. Please grade to one decimal point on each row (e.g., 8.4 out of 10).


Extent and Timing of Participation
Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
Timing and quantity of posts	Respond to only 50% of the required questions or prompts or post late 50% of the time (i.e., posted after the last day of the week).	Respond to only 75% of the required questions or prompts or post late 25% of the time (i.e., posted after the last day of the week).	Respond to all required questions or prompts, most often posting before the end of the week.	Respond to all required questions or prompts, posting before the end of the week.	Respond to all required questions or prompts, with additional self-directed reflections, posting before the end of the week.	0 to 10
Length of posts and pre-mentorship submission.	More than 50% of posts under 250 words or no pre-mentorship submissions.	More than 30% of posts under 250 words or no pre-mentorship submissions.	Most posts at least 250 words and either no pre-mentorship submissions or submissions outside the 1–2 page range.	All posts at least 250 words and pre-mentorship submissions within the 1–2 page range.	All posts at least 250 words, with additional critique and reflections demonstrating self-directed engagement with the blog, and pre-mentorship submissions within the 1–2 page range.	0 to 10

Competencies and Outcomes
Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
Self-awareness	Resist self-reflection and hold rigidly to personal values, beliefs, and assumptions.	Minimize self-reflection on personal values, beliefs, and assumptions.	Demonstrate some self-awareness, and engage in initial exploration of values, beliefs, and assumptions.	Value self-awareness, and engage actively in continued exploration of values, beliefs, and assumptions.	Model reflective practice to challenge actively personal beliefs, biases, and assumptions to align with professional values.	0 to 10
Cognitive complexity	Express either/or, linear, rigid, or uncritical thinking from a narrow, singular frame of reference.	Demonstrate some movement beyond uncritical thinking and cognitive rigidity.	Demonstrate basic critical thinking skills, and step outside of a singular frame of reference by acknowledging alternative perspectives.	Be tolerant of ambiguity, and foster cognitive complexity to enable you to see beyond your own values, worldview, and sociocultural contexts.	Commit actively to valuing diversity of perspectives, and demonstrate comfort with ambiguity and unanswered questions.	0 to 10
Values-based practice	Hold attitudes, values, behaviours, and comportment that contravene the values and virtues of professional counselling and psychology.	Downplay attitudes, values, behaviours, and comportment that reflect the values and virtues of professional counselling and psychology.	Demonstrate, somewhat successfully, attitudes, values, behaviours, and comportment that reflect the values and virtues of professional counselling and psychology.	Articulate and demonstrate attitudes, values, behaviours, and comportment that reflect the values and virtues of professional counselling and psychology.	Take a leadership role in modeling attitudes, values, behaviours, and comportment that reflect the values and virtues of professional counselling and psychology.	0 to 10
Client worldviews	Assume an ethnocentric or monocultural worldview, and prioritize personal beliefs, values, and assumptions over those of clients.	Devalue the diversity of worldviews, and downplay consideration of client beliefs, values, and assumptions.	Acknowledge, with some understanding, the diversity of worldviews, and be willing to consider client beliefs, values, and assumptions.	Value the diversity of worldviews, and prioritize client beliefs, values, and assumptions.	Embrace actively the diversity of worldviews, and foreground effectively client beliefs, values, and assumptions.	0 to 10
Social change	Reject the need for an anti-oppressive approach and take a stance that supports the unjust status quo.	Resist taking an anti-oppressive and justice-doing stance that promotes social change.	Exhibit openness to taking an anti-oppressive and justice-doing stance that advances social change.	Assume an anti-oppressive and justice-doing stance that advances social change.	Take a leadership role in modelling an anti-oppressive stance and justice-doing stance by engaging actively in promoting social change.	0 to 10
Professional values & integrity	Fail to resolve situations that challenge professional values and integrity by prioritizing personal values or holding onto biases.	Attempt, with little success, to resolve situations that challenge professional values and integrity, due to personal-professional values conflicts or personal biases.	Understand, and take initial steps to resolve, situations that challenge professional values and integrity.	Evaluate critically and resolve situations that challenge professional values and integrity.	Predict, evaluate critically, and initiate plans to resolve situations that challenge professional values and integrity.	0 to 10
Additional grade deductions may apply for the following:
Late Submission. See Section 6.3 of the Student Handbook.

Eligible for the Scaffolded Learning Process. See Section 6.6 of the Student Handbook.

One of the central foci of the CRSJ counselling model is the counsellor’s awareness of their own cultural identities. We all bring our cultural selves into our professional roles and into each relationship with our clients. Our cultural identities influence our way of being in relationship; our values, beliefs, and worldviews; the lenses we apply to understanding other people; and the ways in which we are positioned within society. In this assignment, we invite you to reflect critically on the various aspects of your personal cultural identity, both those with which you are most comfortable and those that may be less well understood or critically examined.

Assignment Description

Writing Tips and Samples

Please follow the steps below to complete this assignment. Be sure also to read the assessment criteria carefully to see which competencies you are expected to demonstrate through the completion of this assignment.

Step 1 Create your cultural profile

Review your responses to the learning activities in Weeks 1 to 3, in which you explored the factors that influence who you are as a cultural being. Review the key concepts in these weeks and what you learned from the class discussions and your reflections in your Risk-taking Journal. Apply the metacognitive skills of reflective practice and critical thinking as you integrate these ideas into your assignment clearly, paying attention to the assessment criteria listed below.
Select a creative way to represent some of the key aspects of cultural identities that influence who you are as a person and how you engage with the world around you. You may choose to use photos, collage, music, poetry, video, or any format or medium other than a written essay. Please upload your cultural profile in electronic format to the assignment drop box. If you create a video, please provide a direct link to an external source like Vimeo or YouTube, because the assignment drop box upload size is set at 40 MB. Here are some Video Instructions you may find helpful.

Step 2 Analyze identity narratives and goals

Once you have completed your Cultural Profile, identify 2‒4 elements of your cultural identities in which you have gained new insights, and reflect critically on how these influence your personal identity narratives or stories. For example, you may have taken your gender identity or your physical or mental ability for granted previously and not questioned your identity development or relative social location in this area. Or, you may not have noticed before a particular theme that runs through your overall cultural identity development. Attend to (a) the meaning you make of new insights, (b) the emotions that have been evoked or revealed, and (c) implications for who you are, or who you want to be, as a counsellor.
Conclude with two learning goals for the course related to your own cultural identity development. Consider how you might prepare yourself to lean into and examine critically these less comfortable or conscious elements of your identities throughout the course.

Your cultural profile (Step 1) should take no more than 5 minutes for the instructor to review (e.g., watch a video, read a written submission). Your analysis of identity narratives and goals (Step 2) should be addressed in an additional 2–3 double-spaced pages or equivalent (if Step 1 is presented in a multimedia format). Neither part of the assignment needs to be in APA format, although you should always follow other basic professional writing standards, where applicable.

Although this submission does not require APA formatting, please attend to basic writing standards (e.g., sentence structure, font size, spelling, and grammar) to ensure readability. In addition, if you draw on ideas that derive from anything other than the required readings and weekly learning activities, please accurately cite your sources (you can be creative as to how you do this, depending on the medium you use for your profile) and include an APA formatted reference list (not part of the word count).

If you integrate photos or other multimedia into your cultural profile, you must ensure that (a) you are not violating copyright and (b) you provide appropriate citations and references. For example, you can use your own photos, clip art, or Creative Commons licensed images, but please do not copy an image that is copyrighted by someone else without proper citation and, where required in the copyright, their permission. Check out the reference examples in your APA 7 Manual or online at APA 7: Style Guidelines by Topic.

Because this is not a formal APA paper, you can use a simple acknowledgement of copyright as demonstrated by the Collins (2018), We all suffer, learning activity. However, if you repurpose a figure from an academic source, please provide a complete copyright acknowledgement using the model in the Collins (2018), Deconstructing social class identity, learning activity. You are unlikely to integrate YouTube videos done by other people, but here is an example of that that might look like: Collins (2018), Perfect just the way they are, (notice the video is included in the reference list).

You may find it helpful to review the following examples of the Cultural Profile assignment completed by students in previous years. Please note that these may not show their entire submission and the grading criteria may have evolved over time. They are intended only as examples.

Inka's Cultural Profile: YouTube video
Galina's Cultural Profile: The Girl Who Became 41: A Short Story (Word doc)

The assessment criteria for the Assignment 2 Cultural Profile are listed below. Please pay careful attention to the rubric as you complete your assignment to ensure that you demonstrate the level of learning you personally want to attain through this assignment. Specific descriptors are provided for each level of performance within each of the assessment criteria for the assignment. The expectations for the assignment are best reflected by the descriptors in the B+ to A- range. Please grade to one decimal point on each row (e.g., 8.4 out of 10).

Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
Cultural self-exploration	Resist cultural self-exploration, and devalue cultural sensitivity toward client cultural identities and relationalities.	Demonstrate minimal cultural self-exploration or sensitivity toward client cultural identities and relationalities.	Attempt, with some success, cultural self-exploration as a foundation for cultural sensitivity toward client cultural identities and relationalities.	Engage in cultural self-exploration as a foundation for cultural sensitivity toward client cultural identities and relationalities.	Prioritize in-depth cultural self-exploration as a foundation for cultural sensitivity toward client cultural identities and relationalities.	0 to 10
Intersectionality	Assume that cultural identities and relationalities are essentialized, linear, noninteractive, and decontextualized.	Describe, but struggle to personalize, the complexity and intersectionality of cultural identities and relationalities.	Understand, without critical reflection, some aspects of the complexity and intersectionality of cultural identities and relationalities.	Appreciate, and reflect critically on, the complexity and intersectionality of cultural identities and relationalities.	Synthesize, and evaluate critically, the fluidity, intersectionality, multiplicity, and contextualized nature cultural identities and relationalities.	0 to 10
Identity narratives or stories	Express unawareness or unwillingness to reflect on personal identity narratives or stories.	Exhibit limited awareness through vague or unclear descriptions of personal identity narratives or stories.	Identify at least one theme or thread that reflects personal identity narratives or stories.	Analyze critically one or more themes or threads that form personal identity narratives or stories.	Analyze critically, contextualize, and acknowledge the fluid nature of, one or more personal identity narratives or stories.	0 to 10
Reflective practice	Resist engagement in reflective practice.	Devalue or minimize the process of reflective practice.	Value reflective practice, and take some steps toward both reflection and action.	Engage in critical reflectivity both during and after professional activity, and act upon these reflections.	Prioritize and model critical reflectivity both during and after professional activity, and act effectively upon these reflections.	0 to 10
Continuing competency	Resist self-assessing competence or limitations of competence, and provide no plan to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Attempt, with little success, to self-assess competence or limitations of competence, and articulate a weak or vague plan to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Self-assess competence and limits of competence, with some success, or articulate a weak or vague plan to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Self-assess competence accurately, recognize current limitations of competence, and plan appropriately to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Value and prioritize self-assessment of competence and limitations of competence, and demonstrate commitment to continuing competency development through appropriate planning and action.	0 to 10
Multimedia & digital communication	Fail to employ audio, visual, or digital forms to communicate ideas, issues, and conclusions.	Attempt, with little success, to employ audio, visual, or digital forms to communicate ideas, issues, and conclusions.	Apply, with inconsistent effectiveness, a variety of audio, visual, or digital forms to communicate ideas, issues, and conclusions.	Communicate ideas, issues, and conclusions effectively and professionally in a variety of forms (e.g., internet, social media, audiovisual, blogging).	Make optimal and creative use of a variety of audio, visual, or digital forms to communicate ideas, issues, and conclusions professionally and with originality.	0 to 10
Additional grade deductions may apply for the following:
Late Submission. See Section 6.3 of the Student Handbook.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

The Cultural Interview paper is based on an information interview held with an adult from a cultural background (e.g., ethnicity, Indigeneity, social class, ability, gender identity) that is different from your own. In order to effectively, sensitively, and respectfully conduct this interview, you must meet with this individual face-to-face. Please note: This is not a counselling interview or an intervention. The purpose is simply to gather information about the individual's worldview, value systems, cultural experiences and beliefs, cultural identities and relationalities, and so on. You may also gain insights into their social location, if they speak to their experiences of relative privilege or marginalization within society. The purpose of the paper is to facilitate your understanding of how the key concepts from first two domains of the CRSJ counselling model apply in practice.

Confidentiality and anonymity

Please ensure that no identifying information about the person interviewed is contained in your course submission. Specifically, do not use the person's real name or any other information that could allow others to identify them. You will, of course, discuss their cultural identities or relationalities, because this is the focus of the paper. However, please do so in a way that protects their anonymity. For example, it is not appropriate to say, "Joe is 59 years old and is an Elder on the Tsuut'ina Nation near Calgary." Instead you might say "Joe is middle aged, identifies as First Nations, and is recognized as an Elder within his community." Joe is a pseudonym, of course. You will receive a 5% deduction on your paper if you fail to respect this critical ethical requirement.

Covid-19 Adjustments

Normally students are encouraged to conduct the cultural interview face-to-face in order to optimize your learning and to ensure a focus on relationship building with the interviewee. However, we want to ensure your safety and the safety of the person you interview, so please follow these additional guidelines:

You are advised not to conduct the interview in person if person-to-person contact potentially places you or the interviewee at increased risk.
Please comply with all provincial or regional pandemic guidelines, including regulations for contexts in which you would normally encounter this person (i.e., shared work environments) or other contexts in which you choose to hold the interview.

Assignment Description

Writing and Technical Tips

Step 1 Prepare for the interview

Select an adult to interview. Cultural informants are rich sources of information and insights. Taking into account your own cultural identities or social location, please select an individual from a cultural group with which you are not very familiar or which is outside your comfort zone. Remember culture includes gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, ability, ethnicity, Indigeneity, social class, age, or religion/spirituality. However, if you are aware of a personal bias or discriminatory attitude that you cannot yet fully set aside, and which might limit your ability to demonstrate cultural sensitivity in your interactions, please choose a person who will not be negatively impacted by that bias. Reflect on your decision-making in your Risk-Taking Journal. To comply with the Athabasca University ethical review of this assignment, you must select an individual who is considered a nonvulnerable adult, defined as meeting the criteria given below. Failure to meet these criteria will result in a grade of zero on the assignment.

Individuals must be 18 years and older, and must be legally competent to provide consent.
Those individuals must not be under the direct supervision or care and attention of the student researcher.
Those individuals must not be dependent upon the student researcher’s employer or organization for whom the researcher volunteers for provision of services.
Those individuals must not be incarcerated or otherwise legally confined.

Set ethical boundaries for the interview. The interviewee is a cultural knowledge source not a client, so be sure to position yourself as a cultural learner in this interview. Review the guidelines for optional recording of the interview in the Technical and Writing Tips column (on the right). Discuss the nature of the course assignment with the person you plan to interview, and have that person complete the Consent Form prior to the interview. Email a scanned copy or photo of the completed consent form to your course instructor before submitting your paper for grading. If you do not submit your consent form by the due date of the assignment, the entire assignment will be considered late, and the applicable grade deduction will be accumulated until the consent form is received. You will receive a zero on this assignment if you do not submit the consent form. You are also required to show the completed assignment to the participant before you hand it in.

Increase your cultural awareness. Prepare for the interview by reviewing Core Competencies 1 through 4 of the CRSJ counselling model (Weeks 1 to 4). Review the professional literature for insights about cultural identities or relationalities that might apply to your interviewee. Be sure to consider the multiplicity and intersectionality of cultural identities. Remember, if this were a client, you would not be depending on them to be your sole source of cultural understanding. Make notes of the cultural constructs, contextual and systemic factors, cultural norms, and other key observations that may inform your dialogue. Remember, any cultural hypotheses are tentative at this point; however, they provide a starting place for planning your interview questions.

Draft Interview Questions. Consider how you can foster safety, respect, and trust in your interview. You may find it helpful to develop a few beginning interview questions that are based on your reflection on the course materials and your literature review. Be prepared, however, to be responsive to information provided and to allow space for the interviewee to share what they feel is most important.

You will be best prepared to conduct the interview after you complete Weeks 1 to 4 of the course; therefore, please schedule the interview in Week 5 (or pre-read the textbook materials for Week 4 if you need to conduct the interview in Week 4).

Step 2 Gather and analyze cultural information

Conduct the Interview. Remember the purpose of this activity is to gather information about the individual's worldview, value systems, cultural beliefs and experiences, experiences of cultural identity and relationality, as well any indications of the impact of these on social location. Attend carefully to the ways in which multiple cultural identities intersect. Attend to information provided by the interviewee about how family, community, and broader social contexts and systems influence their lived experiences. Approach your interviewee with an attitude of openness, curiosity, cultural humility, and an appreciation of diversity. Remember, they are the expert on their cultural identities and experiences. You are encouraged to record the interview to help you recall the dialogue; however, you must receive explicit permission for this from the interviewee and record their permission on the consent form.

Critically analyze the interview. The largest portion of your paper is your critical reflection on the information you glean from the interview in light of the course materials and other professional literature. Do not provide only a transcript of your interview. Do not provide a simple, sequential narrative of what the individual said. Step back, and think about, what you learned from the dialogue about the lived experience of cultural identities and social locations for this person. Depending on the interviewee, choose the most appropriate ideas to integrate from ideas from Weeks 1 to 7 of the course. You must analyze critically and integrate both the interview and your literature review information following the steps below.

Develop a thesis statement to provide overall direction for the paper—see the examples below. This requires you to step back from the interview, and think about an overarching theme that connects the interview to your learning in the course. Notice that each of the following theses is presented as an arguable statement.
- George's experiences as a gay man are influenced significantly by his identity as a Metis, supporting the argument for the complexity and interactivity of multiple nondominant identities.
- It is clear from my interactions with Rebecca that there are some situations in which her disability has profound effects and others where it is not a salient element of her identity.
Organize your paper according to a set of key arguments in support of your thesis statement. A short video is provided below this table that expands on the importance of your thesis and arguments. Note: You must highlight your thesis statement and key arguments (use bold or a different colour), so they are obvious to the instructor. If you do not identify your thesis statement and key arguments, your instructor will deduct 5% from the overall grade on the paper.
Your next challenge is to support each argument in a systematic way, by drawing on both the multicultural counselling literature and the data you gathered from your interview. Integrate excerpts from your dialogue with the interviewee to support your arguments. No more than half of the content can be the words of the interviewee. A couple of examples follow.
- The conceptualization of sexual identity within the aboriginal community is less rigid, and diversity is more fully embraced, than in the dominant culture (author, date). George noted: Growing up, my aunt was considered a powerful medicine woman. She lived on her own, and I never really associated gender with her in the way I did with others. It wasn't until my adulthood that I encountered the term, two-spirit. Author (date) contrasted the Indigenous language of two-spirit with western terms for members of sexual minorities, noting the inherent fluidity in the way the former is conceptualized.
- Rebecca felt marginalized by her cognitive disability, particularly in contexts in which people did not know her well: I sometimes feel like I disappear from view, like I become an inanimate fixture in the room. People talk about me, but not with me. Author (date) talked about this sense of invisibility and framed it in terms of cultural blindness.
Because the interviewee is the main information source for this paper, the scholarly foundation in writing expectation is reduced to a minimum of 10 recent, peer-reviewed articles. You are also encouraged to integrate and cite the required readings for the course; however, these will be in addition to the 10 new articles.
Please review these Excerpts from Student Papers to give you ideas about how to organize this section of the paper.

This section of the paper should be 12–15 double-spaced pages in APA format.

Step 3 Reflect on the interview

Synthesize your learning. The final section of the paper must contain a synthesis of your learning. Reflect on your personal cultural profile from Assignment 2 to articulate insights related to your personal cultural identities or social locations. Examine how cultural distance–similarity, relative privilege–marginalization, and cultural preconceptions or biases influenced or shifted through the interview process, drawing on what you have learned from Core Competencies 4 and 5 (Weeks 4–5). Highlight any important new learning about yourself, as a person and a professional, and about potential clients with cultural identities different from your own. Come up with 2‒3 examples of how your practice with clients or your professional self-identity might change, based on what you have learned from this assignment.

Set continuing competency goals. Identify 1‒2 areas where you feel you could continue to benefit from further development of your multicultural or social justice competencies (i.e., knowledge, attitudes, or skills). Be as specific as possible, making explicit links to the CRSJ counselling competencies or suggesting additions or alternatives based on your learning goals.

This section of the paper should be 3–4 double-spaced pages in APA format.

Recording of the interview

You may ask the interviewee if you can record the conversation for the purposes of supporting your writing. They are required to provide explicit permission on the consent form linked in the assignment. If you decide to record the session, please pay attention to these additional guidelines for video, voice, or other forms of recording.

DO NOT use Teams to create the recording, because it automatically saves the recording in the cloud (i.e., not on your personal computer).
Choose a recording process that allows you to save ONLY to the hard drive on your personal computer [or other device that will capture the recording such as your phone]. Do not use any cloud-based storage for video or audio files.
Choose a recording process that either (a) shows only you on the recording and the voice of the interviewee or (b) captures only the audio [of you and your interviewee] not video feed. Zoom, for example, has this option even if you use the videoconference for the interview.
DO NOT permit anyone else to access the video or audio recording. If you are using a shared computer, you must password protect the file.
You are not required to record the interview; you can simply take notes. If you do want to record it, please make your decision in advance. Review the following with the interviewee BEFORE they sign the consent form, and provide this information the course instructor when you submit your signed consent form.

Software you will use,
Type of recording (video, audio),
Where the recording with be stored, and
How you will protect the file.

This assignment continues to build your proficiency with scholarly writing, based on your feedback from Assignments 1 and 3. You will need to discern when a citation is required for your writing. When you draw on the specific articles you have gathered, the need for a citation is obvious. But it might be a bit less clear for other ideas you present based on your learning in the course. Review Section 2, Exhibiting Academic Integrity and Intellectual Honesty, in Collins (2020), Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines to ensure you are able to discern when to cite other authors. The consequences for plagiarism are very serious. If you do not understand these guidelines, please talk to your course instructor! Please also pay particular attention to what we mean by secondary sources. You are expected to demonstrate how properly to manage contributions to an edited book and to seek out and cite original sources where appropriate using APA style.

As part of encouraging your development of proficiency in discerning when to cite other sources, and for this assignment only, you have the option to use the comments function to rationalize why you think a particular sentence requires or doesn't require a citation. You can exercise this option only twice in the paper. You should use this option only if you are unsure or think your decision needs to be justified. If you are unclear about more than two examples then talk with your instructor before you submit the paper.

Review Section 3, Establishing a Scholarly Foundation, in Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines to ensure that you select appropriate and sufficient scholarly sources for your paper. In this assignment, particular emphasis is placed on integrating the professional literature to support the key points in your argument.

Review Section 4, Developing a Writing Plan: Critical Deconstruction, in Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines before you conduct your interview to support your critical analysis of the professional literature. Then, as you analyze the interview to develop your thesis and arguments, paying particular attention to Section 5, Drafting Your Paper: Critical Reconstruction, in Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines.

Be sure to following APA editorial guidelines for the following:

selecting a title and formatting the title page,
formatting your document,
formatting the body of paper,
creating appropriate headings,
providing citations for all sources you quote or paraphrase, and
setting up your reference list.

Guidance is provided in your APA Manual or the APA 7: Style Guidelines by Topic.

The last section, Revising, Editing, and Final Review, Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines provides tips and checklists for ensuring your paper meets both professional writing and APA format standards.

Please carefully review the video below, in which I explain further how to articulate a thesis statement and set of arguments for this assignment. In the second half of the video, I connect these skills to the ongoing development of transdisciplinary program outcomes as you move forward into other GCAP courses. I want to emphasize that you are not required to do advance preparation for GCAP 691. My intent is to foreshadow how the ability to articulate a thesis and argument fits into the big picture of GCAP program outcomes and to give you some tips for planning ahead if you choose to do so. I apologize for the use of the metaphor "double-barreled" in this video; pointing this out gives me an opportunity to model the ongoing process of aligning our language choices with our personal and professional values. If you have difficulty viewing the video, please review the video transcript provided in MS Word.

The assessment criteria for the Assignment 3 Cultural Interview are listed below. Please pay careful attention to the rubric as you complete your assignment to ensure that you demonstrate the level of learning you personally want to attain through this assignment. Specific descriptors are provided for each level of performance within each of the assessment criteria for the assignment. The expectations for the assignment are best reflected by the descriptors in the B+ to A- range. Please grade to one decimal point on each row (e.g., 8.4 out of 10).

Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
A. Integration of Key Concepts
Interviewee worldviews	Assume an ethnocentric or monocultural worldview, and prioritize personal beliefs, values, and assumptions over those of the interviewee.	Devalue the diversity of worldviews, and downplay consideration of client beliefs, values, and assumptions.	Acknowledge, with some understanding, the diversity of worldviews, and be willing to consider interviewee beliefs, values, and assumptions.	Value the diversity of worldviews, and prioritize interviewee beliefs, values, and assumptions.	Embrace actively the diversity of worldviews, and foreground effectively interviewee beliefs, values, and assumptions.	0 to 10
Intersectionality	Assume that interviewee cultural identities and relationalities are essentialized, linear, noninteractive, and decontextualized.	Describe, but struggle to personalize, the complexity and intersectionality of interviewee cultural identities and relationalities.	Understand, without critical reflection, some aspects of the complexity and intersectionality of interviewee cultural identities and relationalities.	Appreciate, and reflect critically on, the complexity and intersectionality of interviewee cultural identities and relationalities.	Synthesize, and evaluate critically, the fluidity, intersectionality, multiplicity, and contextualized nature interviewee cultural identities and relationalities.	0 to 10
Cultural responsivity	Assume that knowledge is culture blind and ignore the limitations of its application to this specific interviewee's lived experiences.	Struggle to appreciate adequately the culture-bound nature of knowledge and the limitations of its application to this interviewee client's lived experiences.	Acknowledge the culture-bound nature of knowledge and the limitations of its application to this specific interviewee's lived experiences.	Assess critically the relevance, and cultural responsivity, of the application of knowledge to this specific interviewee's lived experiences.	Evaluate, critique, and adapt knowledge to ensure its relevance and cultural responsivity to this specific interviewee's lived experiences.	0 to 10
Social injustices	Assume a decontextualized and individualist view of interviewee health and well-being that denies the impact of social injustices and ignores the social determinants of health.	Downplay social determinants of health, and minimize the impact of social injustices on interviewee health and well-being.	Acknowledge social determinants of health, and seek to understand the impact of social injustices on interviewee health and well-being.	Attend actively to social determinants of health, and evaluate the impact of social injustices on interviewee health and well-being.	Evaluate critically social determinants of health and the impact of social injustices on interviewee health and well-being.	0 to 10
B. Application of Professional Writing Principles
Critical analysis	Lack knowledge retention and comprehension in reading, thinking, and writing.	Demonstrate knowledge retention in reading, thinking, and writing.	Demonstrate knowledge comprehension in reading, thinking, and writing.	Demonstrate critical reading, thinking, and writing.	Demonstrate advanced critical analysis and evaluation in reading, thinking, and writing.	0 to 10
Synthesis & Integration	Ignore or misrepresent the professional literature.	Describe the professional literature in a nonintegrative way.	Analyze and report on the professional literature.	Integrate, critique, and synthesize the professional literature.	Integrate, critique, synthesize, and evaluate critically current themes and trends in the professional literature.	0 to 10
Thesis & arguments	Present content in an unorganized way without clear direction or flow.	Present content with weak, but discernible, organizational structure.	Provide a logical flow of topics not articulated adequately as thesis and arguments.	Articulate and support an original thesis and sustained, well-reasoned arguments.	Present a publication-worthy manuscript, based on an original thesis and sustained, well-reasoned, well-organized arguments.	0 to 10
Effective communication	Fail to communicate ideas.	Communicate ideas in a way that is unclear, incoherent, or long-winded.	Communicate ideas with inconsistent clarity and conciseness.	Communicate ideas clearly, succinctly, and effectively to both interviewee and course instructor.	Present ideas professionally, tailored appropriately to the target audience.	0 to 10
Professional writing	Ignore academic and professional writing principles and standards, including APA format.	Attempt, with little success, to implement academic and professional writing principles and standards, making many APA errors.	Apply academic and professional writing principles and standards most of the time, making some APA errors.	Apply academic and professional writing principles and standards consistently, rarely making APA errors.	Model proficiency with academic and professional writing principles and standards, including APA format.	0 to 10
Scholarly foundation	Omit appropriate information sources.	Draw on outdated or nonscholarly information sources or use fewer than 80% of the required number of sources.	Draw on appropriate information sources, but cite only 80% of the required number of sources.	Select appropriate information sources, citing the required number of sources.	Select, evaluate critically, and integrate effectively additional appropriate information sources (beyond the required number) as necessary to support scholarly writing.	0 to 10
C. Personal Reflections
Reflective practice	Resist engagement in reflective practice.	Devalue or minimize the process of reflective practice.	Value reflective practice, and take some steps toward both reflection and action.	Engage in critical reflectivity both during and after professional activity, and act upon these reflections.	Prioritize and model critical reflectivity both during and after professional activity, and act effectively upon these reflections.	0 to 10
Power & privilege	Assume that interviewee and student social locations are irrelevant, and deny the impact of power and privilege on the counselling relationship.	Minimize or ignore the impact of power and privilege on interviewee–student social locations.	Acknowledge the impact of power and privilege on interviewee–student social locations.	Assess critically the impact of power and privilege on interviewee–student social locations.	Evaluate critically the impact of power and privilege on interviewee–student relationships, and commit to addressing differences in social location.	0 to 10
Continuing competency	Resist self-assessing competence or limitations of competence, and provide no plan to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Attempt, with little success, to self-assess competence or limitations of competence, and articulate a weak or vague plan to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Self-assess competence and limits of competence, with some success, or articulate a weak or vague plan to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Self-assess competence accurately, recognize current limitations of competence, and plan appropriately to enhance attitudes, knowledge, and skills.	Value and prioritize self-assessment of competence and limitations of competence, and demonstrate commitment to continuing competency development through appropriate planning and action.	0 to 10

Additional penalties may apply for failure to adhere to the standards of intellectual honesty. If you receive a score of 7.4 (B-) or less, your instructor is required to send your assignment to the course coordinator who will have a discussion with the program director about next steps. See Section 2.4 of the Student Handbook.
Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 – 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 – 10.0
Intellectual honesty & scholarly integrity	Make no attempt to credit information sources.	Attribute ideas inconsistently and inaccurately to their information sources, making many APA errors.	Attribute ideas consistently, but inaccurately, to their information sources, making some APA errors.	Demonstrate intellectual honesty and scholarly integrity; in particular, attribute ideas to their information sources accurately, rarely making APA errors.	Apply intellectual honesty and scholarly integrity standards consistently, professionally, and accurately to share, credit, and honour ideas contributed by others.	0 to 10
Additional grade deductions may apply for the following:
Selecting an interviewee who does not meet the ethics criteria. Submitting the consent form late (i.e., on or after the due date), or submitting the assignment after the due date. See Section 6.3 of the Student Handbook. Leaving the thesis statement and arguments in plain text (i.e., not bold or a different colour) in the paper.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

The CRSJ counselling model is premised on the assumption that all client‒counsellor relationships involve the meeting of diverse cultures (both counsellor’s and client’s). As a result, the course has focused on higher order principles for multicultural and social justice competence and has applied these, primarily, with individuals with multiple and intersecting cultural identities and social locations. However, I cannot possibly cover all key concepts related to multicultural counselling and social justice or address the lived experience of each unique client you may encounter. So, this assignment offers you the opportunity to focus on concepts and nondominant populations that are of particular interest to you.

Optional

You may choose to complete this assignment on your own or in a small group (2‒3 students maximum and from the same section of the course). If you choose to work together, you can divide up the work however you choose. All group members will receive the same grade. Please list all of your names on the sign-up sheet in Moodle to indicate to your instructor that you plan to work with a small group.

Assignment Description

Writing Tips and Samples

Step 1 Follow your passion

Identify a learning or competency development gap. You can draw on your personal cultural identities, lived experiences, or professional experiences; the cultural interview you conducted; a current national or world event or issue; a gap in the professional literature; or something else that draws your attention.

Select a key concept related to that gap, and which is not listed in the key concepts in the weekly learning processes for the course. You can choose one we have not addressed from the course text or one you identify yourself.

Select a nondominant population with whom you would like to apply the key concept to fill the learning gap. You can also address multiple or intersecting identities if you like, because one of the messages in this course is that these intersections create new layers of complexity for working with clients. You must be able to justify your choice of nondominant population based on the principles in the course related to privilege, marginalization, and social location. There is no need to sign up for your choice of key concept or cultural identities, because it is very unlikely that several people will choose exactly the same combinations.

Step 2 Teach your peers

Create a short learning activity. Let your creative energies flow as you design an activity that engages your peers in working with the key concept you selected and in applying it with the nondominant population(s) you selected. Many examples of learning activities have been provided in the course. Please attend to one or more of the three metacognitive skills (i.e., critical thinking, cognitive complexity, and reflective practice) the course has emphasized in designing the learning process for your peers. You can link to external resources, multimedia, activities, and so on; however, these must be openly accessible online.

Preface your learning activity with a 2–3 page, double-spaced rationale and orientation to the issue or gap, written in APA format and supported by at least 4 current sources. Clearly identify the corresponding key concept and nondominant population(s). This is not a formal paper, so you do not require an introduction and conclusion.
Make the learning activity itself a maximum of 1200 words (or an approximate equivalent if you are integrating, or presenting through, multimedia sources). It should take your peers or instructor no more than 15–20 minutes to complete. Unlike the rationale and orientation, the learning activity does not need to be in APA format; however, you must give appropriate credit to all sources beyond the course materials. Your learning activity must conclude with a discussion question or prompt.

All learning activities will be presented in Week 12 of the course. Post your learning activity by Tuesday Week 11 to the Student Learning Activities discussion forum in Week 12. You are responsible for leading (or co-leading) the discussion related to your learning activity. You are required to participate in the discussion of three of the learning activities posted by your peers. There will be no other weekly learning activities or required readings during Week 10.

Although the learning activity itself does not require APA formatting, please attend to basic writing standards (e.g., sentence structure, font size, spelling, and grammar) to ensure readability.

If you choose to embed images or other resources directly into your learning activity (as opposed to providing a link to them), you must attend to copyright regulations and credit your sources, where appropriate. Please carefully review the guidelines provided under Assignment 2: Cultural Profile, Assignment Description.

Several students from previous years have granted permission for me to provide you with examples of their learning activities. Please treat these with respect and do not circulate them to others. Remember, the specific requirements and assessment criteria for this assignment may differ this year.

Scott's Learning Activity: Reducing Internalized Stigma of Mental Illness through Reduction of Microaggressions (Word doc)
Sarah's Learning Activity: Recognizing Ageism and Implementing Social Justice at the Mesolevel (Originally embedded in Moodle post, so reproduced as a webpage here.)

This assignment builds on your development of voice from Assignment 1 and gives you a chance to continue to build proficiency with APA format. Your instructor will pay particular attention to the your consistency and accuracy in citing and referencing the current sources you use in the 2–3 page rationale and orientation to your learning activity.

You may want to revisit Section 2, Exhibiting Academic Integrity and Intellectual Honesty, in Collins (2020), Professional Writing in the Health Disciplines. The consequences for plagiarism are very serious. If you do not understand these guidelines, please talk to your course instructor!

Review your APA Manual or the APA 7: Style Guidelines by Topic for information about the following topics:

integrating citations,
integrating quotations,
integrating multiple sources,
sources repeated in same paragraph, and
secondary sources.

The assessment criteria for the Assignment 4 Learning Activity and Discussion Leadership are listed below. You will notice that there are no disciplinary competencies targeted, because you are free to target any topic that fits within the overall focus of the course. Please pay careful attention to the rubric as you complete your assignment to ensure that you demonstrate the level of learning you personally want to attain through this assignment. Specific descriptors are provided for each level of performance within each of the assessment criteria for the assignment. The expectations for the assignment are best reflected by the descriptors in the B+ to A- range. Please grade to one decimal point on each row (e.g., 8.4 out of 10).

Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
A. Rationale for the Learning Activity
Synthesis & Integration	Ignore or misrepresent the professional literature.	Describe the professional literature in a nonintegrative way.	Analyze and report on the professional literature.	Integrate, critique, and synthesize the professional literature.	Integrate, critique, synthesize, and evaluate critically current themes and trends in the professional literature.	0 to 10
Professional writing	Ignore academic and professional writing principles and standards, including APA format.	Attempt, with little success, to implement academic and professional writing principles and standards, making many APA errors.	Apply academic and professional writing principles and standards most of the time, making some APA errors.	Apply academic and professional writing principles and standards consistently, rarely making APA errors.	Model proficiency with academic and professional writing principles and standards, including APA format.	0 to 10
Scholarly foundation	Omit appropriate information sources.	Draw on outdated or nonscholarly information sources or use fewer than 80% of the required number of sources.	Draw on appropriate information sources, but cite only 80% of the required number of sources.	Select appropriate information sources, citing the required number.	Select, evaluate critically, and integrate effectively additional appropriate information sources (beyond the required number) as necessary to support scholarly writing.	0 to 10
B. Focus and Intent of the Learning Activity
Cultural diversity	Express views that may result in dignitary harm to persons or peoples from other cultures in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Undervalue the importance of respect for, and responsivity to, cultural diversity in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Acknowledge, but apply inconsistently, respect for, and responsivity to, cultural diversity in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Value, respect, and be responsive to cultural diversity in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Commit to, and advocate for, cultural inclusivity and responsivity in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	0 to 10
Social justice	Reject responsibility for the welfare of others or justify social injustice in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Minimize responsibility for the welfare of others and the promotion of social justice in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Value the welfare of others and the promotion of social justice in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Take action to safeguard the welfare of others and to promote social justice in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	Assume a leadership role in safeguarding the welfare of others and promoting social justice in the focus and intent of the learning activity.	0 to 10
C. Design and Delivery of the Learning Activity
Dissemination of knowledge	Communicate knowledge ineffectively, making it inaccessible to others.	Understand and communicate knowledge in a linear and purely descriptive way, making it less accessible to other users.	Analyze, report on, and distribute knowledge in a variety of forms to make it available to other users.	Synthesize, organize, create, and distribute knowledge in a variety of forms (e.g., electronic, written, oral, visual) to make it available to other users.	Model creativity and professionalism by synthesizing, organizing, creating, and distributing knowledge in a variety of forms to make it inviting and accessible to other users.	0 to 10
Teaching & learning	Make no attempt to implement teaching and learning strategies in the design and delivery of the learning activity.	Use some teaching and learning strategies ineffectively in the design and delivery of the learning activity.	Use some teaching and learning strategies with moderately good effect in the design and delivery of the learning activity.	Implement teaching and learning strategies effectively in the design and delivery of the learning activity.	Implement teaching and learning strategies consistently, effectively, creatively, and responsively in the design and delivery of the learning activity.	0 to 10
D. Discussion Leadership
Effective communication	Fail to communicate ideas.	Communicate ideas in a way that is unclear, incoherent, or long-winded.	Communicate ideas with inconsistent clarity and conciseness.	Communicate ideas clearly, succinctly, and effectively to your peers.	Present ideas professionally, tailored appropriately to your peers.	0 to 10
Technology-mediated interaction	Fail to engage, or interact ineffectively and unprofessionally, with peers through technology-mediated platforms.	Engage minimally, or interact with minimal effectiveness and professionalism, with peers through technology-mediated platforms.	Engage inconsistently in an effective and professional manner with peersthrough technology-mediated platforms.	Interact effectively and professionally with peers through technology-mediated platforms (i.e., digital discussion forums).	Make optimal and creative use of technology-mediated platforms to interact effectively and professionally with peers.	0 to 10

Additional penalties may apply for failure to adhere to the standards of intellectual honesty. If you receive a score of 7.4 (B-) or less, your instructor is required to send your assignment to the course coordinator who will have a discussion with the program director about next steps. See Section 2.4 of the Student Handbook.
Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 – 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 – 10.0
Intellectual honesty & scholarly integrity	Make no attempt to credit information sources.	Attribute ideas inconsistently and inaccurately to their information sources, making many APA errors.	Attribute ideas consistently, but inaccurately, to their information sources, making some APA errors.	Demonstrate intellectual honesty and scholarly integrity; in particular, attribute ideas to their information sources accurately, rarely making APA errors.	Apply intellectual honesty and scholarly integrity standards consistently, professionally, and accurately to share, credit, and honour ideas contributed by others.	0 to 10
Additional grade deductions may apply for the following:
Late Submission, including failing to post your presentation by Tuesday Week 11. See Section 6.3 of the Student Handbook.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

In certain weeks you will participate in class discussions or problem-based learning activities. The rationale for including class discussions in most GCAP courses is based in constructivist learning theory. Here are some basic principles of constructivist learning:

Learning is an active not a passive process. Particularly in graduate studies, you are not simply offered knowledge to absorb and reproduce. You are part of a learning community in which your active contribution to your own learning is essential to the outcomes targeted.
Learning is creative. It occurs when people construct meaning through engagement with ideas, experiences, and their own responses to those ideas.
Learning is social. As a social activity, meaning is co-constructed through interaction with others. The class discussions are intended to mirror the constructive collaboration that occurs in your dialogue with clients.
Learning occurs in context. We are all culture-bound, to some degree, in the sense that we exist within particular sociocultural contexts and bring forward our own cultural lenses in our meaning-making. The beauty of dialogue is that it always reflects a meeting of cultures, in the same way that we have argued that all counselling is multicultural. In this interaction, the possibility for generating new perspectives and for moving outside of our cultural encapsulation is optimized.
Learning is continuous. You may think you have gained everything you can from a particular reading or learning activity in the course as you worked through it on your own. However, active engagement in conversations with others gives you an opportunity to apply ideas in practice, to build on the learning brought forward by others, and to consider and reconsider your own perspectives.
Learning is purposeful. A number of metacognitive skills have been introduced that are designed to enhance your competency as a counselling practitioner, and these are based on the premise that you can learn how to learn. These same skills (e.g., cognitive complexity, critical thinking, reflective practice) are engaged through engagement with other people.

The class discussions are intended to mirror the kinds of conversations that occur in face-to-face graduate seminars, in a peer consultation or supervision groups in counselling practice, or in professional dialogues in other contexts. You are expected to read and consider what others have said before you contribute to the dialogue, so that your post is responsive, additive, and co-constructive.

Your instructor will facilitated the discussions in the first five weeks. Their roles are to (a) keep the dialogue moving and on track; (b) introduce new ideas, ask challenging questions, invite consideration of alternative perspectives; and (c) pull out important themes, synthesize the learning, and provide feedback related to competency development. Beginning in Week 6, students increasingly take over leadership of the discussion forums, by assuming particular roles, leading discussions on their learning activity (Assignment 4), and collaborating on the problem-based learning activities in Weeks 10 and 11. It is your responsibility to make the class discussions vibrant and interesting.

Professional writing or APA are not directly assessed in the class discussions. Although you are expected to write professionally, the intent is for this to be a conversation not a paper!

Do not provide references for course materials; however, be clear when you are referring to a specific reading, learning activity, or author perspective (e.g., "In learning activity #4, I discovered . . ." or "I appreciated Lavell's [2018] perspective on . . .").
Do not provide citations when discussing or applying key concepts or principles from the course materials more broadly or personally (e.g., "I struggle with self-disclosure, because . . ." or "Applying critical theory to this scenario involves. . .").
Do provide a citation and the full reference in APA format, when you draw on sources not included in the course materials (e.g., articles you introduced for the problem-based learning activities in Weeks 10 and 11). You will not be graded on APA; this is intended as an opportunity for you to practice citing and referencing various types of sources. If you are unsure of how to do that, invite feedback from your peers. Similarly, offer such feedback when invited, so you help each other develop these skills.

The expectations for quantity and quality of posts are provided in the evaluation criteria below.

Participate fully in all class discussions and problem-based learning activities.
Don't over-post: Exceeding the assessment criteria will not result in a higher grade, because over-posting may clutter the forums and detract from the learning experience of other students.
Spread your posts out throughout the first five days of the GCAP week (Wednesday through Sunday), reserving Monday for syntheses, summaries, or final reflections on the dialogue. Certain class discussions may require a specific posting schedule. We recommend you take Tuesday as a non-GCAP day to rejuvenate. Consistently posting only on Monday and Tuesday, does not demonstrate active engagement in the ongoing conversation and will result in a lower participation mark.
Attend to both quality and quantity. Although quality and quantity criteria are listed separately, they interact with one another. For example, a very insightful and well-articulated post on Monday or Tuesday offers little opportunity for constructivist learning and may not receive full marks.

If you are unable to participate fully in class discussions (e.g., for medical reasons), you must discuss this in advance with the course instructor. For absences of more than two weeks, you must obtain advance permission from the course coordinator, and work out an alternative plan for meeting the competencies targeted through the class discussions. Extended absences may necessitate withdrawal from the course.

Please complete the attached Class Participation Self-Assessment and submit it to the assignment dropbox. Your instructor may adjust your final grade based on the degree to which you meet the assessment criteria. You are required to identify and analyze 6 posts from at least 3 different weeks to support your self-assessment in each of three categories: (a) active engagement in constructivist learning, (b) critical engagement with course content, and (c) application to problem-based learning. To support the application to problem-based learning, choose 2 of the 6 posts from Weeks 10 and 11. In each category, you do not need to meet all of the evaluation criteria in each post, but you must demonstrate them in your combination of posts.

The assessment criteria for the Assignment 5 Class Discussions and Problem-Based Learning are listed below. Please pay careful attention to the rubric as you participate in the class discussions to ensure that you demonstrate the level of learning you personally want to attain through this assignment. Specific descriptors are provided for each level of performance within each of the assessment criteria for the assignment. The expectations for the assignment are best reflected by the descriptors in the B+ to A- range. Please grade to one decimal point on each row (e.g., 8.4 out of 10).


Extent and Timing of Participation (6%)
Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
Timing of posts	Respond to only 50% of the required questions or prompts or post late 50% of the time (i.e., post on Monday or Tuesday).	Respond to only 70% of the required questions or prompts or post late 30% of the time (i.e., post on Monday or Tuesday).	Respond to all required questions or prompts, with posts towards the end of the week 30% of the time (i.e., post on Sunday or Monday), and no posts on Tuesday.	Respond to all required questions or prompts, with posts paced throughout week, at least one post before Saturday noon MST, and no posts on Tuesday.	Respond to all required questions or prompts, with posts paced strategically based on the flow of the conversation, at least one post before Saturday noon MST, and no posts on Tuesday.	0 to 10
Quantity of posts	Post 1–2 nonsubstantive responses per question or prompt and demonstrate little or no active engagement with peers.	Post 1–2 nonsubstantive responses per question or prompt or demonstrate little or no active engagement with peers.	Post 2–3 substantive responses per question or prompt, with some active engagement with peers.	Post 3–4 substantive responses per question or prompt, and demonstrate active engagement with the perspectives of peers in at least 2 of these posts.	Post 3–4 substantive responses per question or prompt, and demonstrate advanced critical reflection and co-construction of meaning with peers in at least 2 of these posts.	0 to 10
Length of posts	More than 50% of posts under 200 words or over 300 words (excluding references or links).	More than 30% posts under 200 words or over 300 words (excluding references or links).	At least 80% of posts between 200 and 300 words (excluding references or links).	At least 90% of posts between 200 and 300 words (excluding references or links).	100% of posts between 200 and 300 words (excluding references or links).	0 to 10

Quality of Participation (14%)
Assessment Criteria	Below Standard F to C+	Support Required B-	Approaches Standard B	Meets Standard B+ to A-	Exceeds Standard A to A+	Grade
	0 to 6.9	7.0 to 7.4	7.5 to 7.9	8.0 to 8.9	9.0 to 10.0
A. Active Engagement in Constructive Learning
Effective communication	Fail to communicate ideas.	Communicate ideas in a way that is unclear, incoherent, or long-winded.	Communicate ideas with inconsistent clarity and conciseness.	Communicate ideas clearly, succinctly, and effectively to interdisciplinary, specialist, and nonspecialist audiences.	Present ideas professionally, tailored appropriately to the target audience.	0 to 10
Positive relationships	Exhibit poor interpersonal relationships and problem-solving skills.	Make minimal efforts to foster relationships and solution-focused interactions.	Attempt, somewhat successfully, to develop effective relationships and to interact in a positive solution-focused manner.	Develop and maintain effective relationships, and interact in a positive solution-focused manner.	Assume a leadership role in advancing effective relationships and positive, solution-focused interactions.	0 to 10
Collaboration	Devalue, or refuse to engage in, collaboration with peers.	Attempt, with little success, to collaborate respectfully and effectively with peers.	Attempt, with some success, to collaborate respectfully and effectively with peers.	Collaborate respectfully and effectively with peers.	Assume a leadership role in fostering respectful and effective collaboration with peers.	0 to 10
Constructivist learning	Ignore the ideas of peers.	Engage only in cheerleading responses to peers, without integrating their ideas.	Acknowledge the ideas of peers, without actively fostering, or engaging in, co-construction of meaning.	Foster actively creative, purposeful, contextualized, and collaborative constructive learning processes.	Assume a leadership role in engaging peers in creative, purposeful, contextualized, and collaborative constructive learning processes.	0 to 10
B. Critical Engagement with Course Content
Cognitive complexity	Express either/or, linear, rigid, or uncritical thinking from a narrow, singular frame of reference.	Demonstrate some movement beyond uncritical thinking and cognitive rigidity.	Demonstrate basic critical thinking skills, and step outside of a singular frame of reference by acknowledging alternative perspectives.	Be tolerant of ambiguity, and foster cognitive complexity to enable you to see beyond your own values, worldview, and sociocultural contexts.	Commit actively to valuing diversity of perspectives, and demonstrate comfort with ambiguity and unanswered questions.	0 to 10
Generalization of knowledge	Ignore relevant knowledge that could be applied to new questions, problems, or contexts.	Struggle to apply knowledge to new questions, problems, or contexts.	Apply knowledge to new questions, problems, or contexts.	Analyze critically, apply, and generalize knowledge to new questions, problems, or contexts.	Analyze critically, synthesize, and evaluate the generalization of knowledge to new questions, problems, or contexts.	0 to 10
Cultural diversity	Express views that may result in dignitary harm to persons or peoples from other cultures.	Undervalue the importance of respect for, and responsivity to, cultural diversity.	Acknowledge, but apply inconsistently, respect for, and responsivity to, cultural diversity.	Value, respect, and be responsive to cultural diversity.	Commit to, and advocate for, cultural inclusivity and responsivity.	0 to 10
C. Application to Problem-Based Learning
Cultural responsivity	Assume that knowledge is culture blind and ignore the limitations of its application across contexts.	Struggle to appreciate adequately the culture-bound nature of knowledge and the limitations of its application across contexts.	Acknowledge the culture-bound nature of knowledge and the limitations of its application across contexts.	Assess critically the relevance, and cultural responsivity, of the application of knowledge within individual, family, community, social, and global contexts.	Evaluate, critique, and adapt knowledge to ensure its relevance and cultural responsivity to individual, family, community, social, and global contexts.	0 to 10
Responsive mesolevel change	Resist engaging in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the mesolevel.	Attempt, with little success, to engage in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the mesolevel.	Engage, to some degree, in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the mesolevel in collaboration with, or on behalf of, clients.	Engage in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the mesolevel (i.e., schools, organizations, and communities) in collaboration with, or on behalf of, clients.	Articulate an evidenced-based position in support of, and implement effectively and collaboratively, culturally responsive and socially just change at the mesolevel.	0 to 10
Responsive macrolevel change	Resist engaging in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the macrolevel.	Attempt, with little success, to engage in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the macrolevel.	Engage, to some degree, in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the macrolevel on behalf of clients.	Engage in culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the macrolevel (i.e., broad social, economic, and political systems) on behalf of clients.	Articulate an evidenced-based position in support of, and implement effectively, culturally responsive and socially just change processes at the macrolevel.	0 to 10

Week	Learning Processes	Required Discussions	Due Dates	Assessment Processes	Weight
1	Culturally Responsive and Socially Just (CRSJ) Counselling	Class Discussion	Tuesday Week 1	Learning Plan Part I	P/F
2	Complexity of Cultural Identity and Relationality	Class Discussion
3	Multiplicity and Subjectivity of Worldviews	Class Discussion
4	Social Injustice and Social Determinants of Health	Class Discussion	Tuesday Week 4	Assignment 2 Cultural Profile	15%
5	An Uneven Playing Field: Privilege and Marginalization	Class Discussion	Tuesday Week 5	Assignment 1 Risk-Taking Journal - Reflections 1
6	Nondominant and Dominant Cultural Identity Development	Class Discussion		Assignment 1 Risk-Taking Journal - Dialogue 1 (based on sign up time)
7	Cross-Cultural Transitioning, Internalized Oppression, and Trauma			Assignment 1 Risk-Taking Journal - Dialogue 1 (based on sign up time)
8	Professional Identity: Anti-Oppression and Justice-Doing	Class Discussion	Tuesday Week 8	Assignment 3 Cultural Interview Paper	30%
9	Responsive Case Conceptualization and Intervention Planning
10	Systems Level Change and Socially Just Practice	Problem-Based Learning (PBL) Discussion	Tuesday Week 10	Assignment 1 Risk-Taking Journal - Reflections 2	15%
11	Systems Level Change and Socially Just Practice	PBL Discussion	Tuesday Week 11	Assignment 4 Learning Activity + Discussion Leadership OPTIONAL: Assignment 1 Risk-Taking Journal - Dialogue 2	20%
12	Student-Lead Learning Activities	Student Presentations: Learning Activity
13	Continuing Competency and Professional Identity Development	Class Discussion	Tuesday Week 13	Learning Plan Part II Assignment 5 Class Discussions and Problem-Based Learning	P/F 20%

Course Assignments and Assessment Criteria

Eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Step 1 Create your blog

Step 2 Welcome mentorship

Extent and Timing of Participation

Competencies and Outcomes

Step 1 Create your cultural profile

Step 2 Analyze identity narratives and goals

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Step 1 Prepare for the interview

Step 2 Gather and analyze cultural information

Step 3 Reflect on the interview

A. Integration of Key Concepts

B. Application of Professional Writing Principles

C. Personal Reflections

Additional penalties may apply for failure to adhere to the standards of intellectual honesty.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Step 1 Follow your passion

Step 2 Teach your peers

A. Rationale for the Learning Activity

B. Focus and Intent of the Learning Activity

C. Design and Delivery of the Learning Activity

D. Discussion Leadership

Additional penalties may apply for failure to adhere to the standards of intellectual honesty.

Not eligible for the Mastery Learning Process

Extent and Timing of Participation (6%)

Quality of Participation (14%)

A. Active Engagement in Constructive Learning

B. Critical Engagement with Course Content

C. Application to Problem-Based Learning