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Contemplating the school to work transition in the insecure and unpredictable twenty-first century world of work can be anxiety inducing for college students. Consequently, college students may develop disempowered career stories in which they feel ill prepared to explore career prospects or engage with the world of work. This paper describes a career counselling intervention aimed at transforming the disempowered career stories of college students into more empowered versions. Grounded in career construction theory and designed as a group modality, the intervention employs poetry therapy to enhance the development of internally defined and motivated career stories among the group participants. Although this paper highlights the Kenyan context, the intervention itself can easily be adapted to other contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

“What am I without paid work?” Some would say, “A non-person.” Others might say, “Free!” The experience of retirement is explored using creative writing for therapeutic purposes. Written from the perspective of fictional British retirees from different workplaces, the paper offers a view of how expressive and reflective writing can be both therapy and research at times of transition. Little in the literature on retirement in the UK uses the “experience near” approaches of writing as inquiry. This paper will point out some of the benefits of research methods that are “up close and personal”, culturally embedded and embodied. Encouraging the use of playful, creative writing in individual counselling and in groups is one of the aims of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including the benefit of creative methods in counseling, the use of combined quantitative career testing and narrative career counseling, and the Dialogical Temporal Chair Technique.

An introduction is presented in which the editors discuss various reports within the issue on topics including poetry therapy, grief and narrative therapy.