Professional advocacy as a key competence in career guidance education in Norway, Sweden and Denmark

Project summary

In this project, we explore the concept of advocacy and whether and how it is present in the curricula for education programmes of career guidance and counsellor professionals and related policy documents in three Nordic countries. There are long traditions for advocacy and social engagement in the Nordic public sector, including the career guidance services, and the ideas of equality and social justice lay as a foundation for the Nordic welfare model and people’s self-understanding. Currently, the model is challenged by globalisation, both economically and politically, and inequality and differences between groups are increasing in the Nordic countries, thus highlighting the need for advocacy in career guidance. The advocating role of career guidance professionals is emphasized in the NICE handbooks on academic training of career guidance and counselling professionals. However, not much is known about whether or how competences for advocacy are anchored in the education programmes, thus the objectives of the project is to provide a first insight.

Method

Qualitative document analyses of curricula and relevant policy documents from CGC education programmes in three Nordic countries, Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The project will shed a light on how CGC education programmes in Denmark, Norway and Sweden prepare their students for the role of advocating, including professional agency and the capacity to act for advocacy, as reflected in the curricula and policy documents. The core data are all curricula carried out in the study year 2018-19 by the CGC education programmes in the three countries.