This study will focus on the professional identity of school counseling, which is a key function in Israeli schools. Forming a professional identity is part of the process of professional development that begins with academic training and continues throughout one’s professional career. Professional identity distinguishes between different occupations and provides practitioners with a safe base that lets them better understand their work and form a team spirit within their field of occupation. The research literature indicates an association between one’s professional identity and her professional functioning and success, sense of stability, confidence, and pride in practicing the occupation. The professional identity of school counseling is related to gender. This is a predominantly female occupation and most of its practitioners in Israel are women. Few studies have been conducted on the professional identity of school counselors (Note 1) and its impact on the quality of their work. It appears that the definition of the school counselor’s role is neither clear nor unambiguous, both in Israel and elsewhere, and this affects the professional identity of counselors and the quality of their work. The current study included semi-structured interviews with 15 school counselors, in which they spoke about the structure of their work, their professional vision, satisfaction, and sense of self-fulfillment as a result of their job, as well as their professional self-efficacy. The research findings show that the structure of the counselor’s work, her role definition and workload, are related to her professional identity, including how she perceives the counseling occupation, her satisfaction and sense of self-fulfillment. Based on the interviews, no differences were found between the narratives of counselors with different levels of seniority in the profession with regard to professional identity, satisfaction, and self-fulfillment. The research findings indicate the need to define the school counseling occupation and its place in the school in order to help school counselors establish a clearer professional identity, with the aim of adapting the role to the challenges of the school system in the 21st century, in the world in general and in Israel in particular.

<p style="text-align: justify;">This article focuses on the influence of academic training, job issues, personality and demographic characteristics of school counselors on their professional identity construction, which is developed in a theoretical model based on educational-psychological theories. Most of the training in Master's degree studies in school counseling is incompatible with actual job demands; Consequently, when beginning work, school counselors lack suitable training and relevant professional tools. Moreover, in Israel and elsewhere, the definition of school counseling is unclear and inconclusive, and this affects the counselors' professional identity and the quality of their work. The proposed model of the variables that affect school counselors’ professional identity may enhance the relationship between academia and the field, with the aim of promoting academic excellence and a well-formulated professional identity for the profession of school counseling, as well as improving the employment terms of school counselors, in light of the challenges facing higher education systems in the 21st century.</p>

The current study focuses on the concept of professional identity in the school counseling profession, its definition and measurement. According to the definition in this study, the concept of &ldquo;professional identity&rdquo; is divided in two: personal professional identity, which is the practitioner&rsquo;s sense of belonging to and solidarity with the profession, and group professional identity, which includes the features attributed to the profession, both by those who belong to it and by those who do not practice it, and makes it possible to discern between professions. The school counseling profession, occupied mainly by women, is contending with a lack of clarity regarding its role definition, role boundaries, and demands. Therefore, despite the change in the status of the profession in recent years, various issues impede the group professional identity of school counseling and the personal profession identity of its practitioners. This study is the first to examine the professional identity of school counselors on two levels: personal and group, among school counselors in Israel. The study included 174 school counselors who completed two professional identity scales constructed for the purpose of the study. Each scale underwent factor analysis, and a significant association was found between the two scales and the factors they comprised. The research findings indicate that the personal professional identity of school counselors is affected by their group professional identity, and vice versa. The research findings indicate the need to distinguish in future studies between personal and group professional identity, both in the school counseling profession and in other professions, particularly in a world characterized by professional mobility where current professions will become irrelevant while others will be in demand and there may be a need to define the personal and group professional identity of workers.

The concept of professional identity is attributed to both personal and group levels. The school counseling profession lack clear definition jeopardized the development of counselors' professional identity. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to elucidate school counseling professional identity by testing the relation between personal and group professional identity in various related aspects. To examine, a total of 161 school counselors filled out questionnaires to assess personal and group professional identity along with seniority, job satisfaction, work commitment and self-efficacy. Results showed that seniority, work commitment and self-efficacy affect the counselor's personal and group professional identity. However, the job satisfaction was associated only with the personal identity. Additionally, correlations between job satisfaction and job commitment, and personal and group professional identity were found to differ, respectively. In conclusion, there is a clear distinction between personal and group professional identity, which may explain the uncertainty of school counseling professional identity. Finally, recommendations to school counseling profession are discussed for implications of our results to other professions.

Previous studies confirmed that training for master’s programs for school counseling is deficient. The present study differentiates between three types of academic institutions that train school counselors in Israel: Universities, education colleges and academic colleges, in terms of how professional counselors evaluate the efficiency of academic studies to the school fieldwork and their impact on personal and group professional identity. A total of 158 school counselors, divided into groups of educational institutions, participated in this study. Of whom 5 men and 153 women, aged 27 to 63 years (M = 43.63; SD = 8.11), while the seniority in counseling profession ranged from 1 to 32 years (M = 9.65, SD = 7.60). After factor analysis of the ‘School Counselling Training Efficiency’ questionnaire, a significant difference between the training institutions was found only in the training efficiency, but not in professional identities. Universities-trained counselors reported less training efficiency than counselors trained at education and academic colleges. The average of academic training efficiency was also low in two typical colleges. Training efficiency fully mediate mediated the relationship between training institution and both professional identities. The research findings raised pointed questions about the efficiency of training for school counselors in academia, in all educational institutions. It is important to develop evaluation of school counseling students in their training to support personal and group professional identity.