Preparing Counselors to Work in Rural Areas

Episode

Drs. Elliott and Murray discuss their program for training counselors to work in rural areas. They share the challenges they have faced and talk about how educators and supervisors can approach readying students to work in rural communities.

Guests

Dr. Anna Elliott's teaching and supervision is grounded in a social constructivist philosophy where collaboration and empowerment are central. Her coursework as an instructor has included multicultural awareness, family theories, rural counseling, diagnosis, trauma, and clinical lab courses. As an active mental health clinician, she specializes in working with families, adolescents, and trauma recovery from a relational-cultural psychodynamic approach. Her research and scholarship centers around enhancing counselor development and improving and increasing mental health access. On a micro level, this involves exploring what factors enhance counselor-in-training development. On a macro level, her grant activity and research focus on how to systemically address mental health needs in rural communities

Kirsten Murray is Professor and Chair of the Department of Counseling at the University of Montana. Her academic background is also in Counselor Education and Supervision. She is a licensed counselor and her clinical and academic interests align in the areas of couple and family counseling, foundational counseling skills, and fostering access and equity in the counseling profession.