Legal & Ethics by Dr. Carolyn Stone

Dr. Carolyn Stone is a Professor and Counselor Educator at the University of North Florida, Jacksonville, Florida.

Dr. Stone has been a past president of American School Counselor Association and has been the ASCA Ethics Chair for more than 20 years.

Competing interests between a minor's need for confidentiality and the legal rights of parents as established by the U.S. Supreme Court can be the guiding voice in the lives of children. 

Participants will develop an ethical decision making framework for analyzing and resolving ethical issues through the application of ASCA ethical codes, case and statutory law, school board rules, and community standards.

Through small group and large group discussion of 40 case studies, participants will be given the opportunity to increase their understanding of the complexities of respecting a minor’s right to confidentiality, to develop a sensitivity to the need to consider their actions in context of each situation for each individual student, and to understand the rights of parents.

Topics of discussion will include areas such as confidentiality and duty to warn, minors’ rights to privacy, counselors’ responsibilities toward suicidal children, civil and criminal liability, sexually active minor clients, birth control, abortion counseling, defamation, child abuse, HIV positive students, case notes and educational records, malpractice in academic advising, sexual harassment, the Hatch Amendment and guidance curriculum, and personal conduct.