Introduction to the special issue

In 2010, our article "Professional identity development: A grounded theory of transformational tasks of new counselors" was published in Counselor Education & Supervision and was the impetus for three other specific studies on professional identity development (i.e., doctoral students, practitioners, and counselor educators).Professional discourse around the 20/20 Vision for the Future of Counseling (Kaplan et al., 2014) focused on defining professional identity, and there was a corresponding rise in published research and conceptual pieces on professional identity in our professional counseling journals.In the last few years, we (Gibson and Dollarhide) were often asked about summarizing this research and providing some direction on the future of professional identity research.Making time for this was challenging until the perfect (said with some irony) opportunity presented itself in the form of the COVID-19 pandemic.In mid-2020, we decided to work on a project to summarize the existing professional identity research.We were working from home and could dedicate at least one morning per week to the project, so we invited several of our current and former doctoral students to assist in a qualitative content analysis.For those who have engaged in this method before, there is a shared understanding of how complex it can be.However, meeting one early morning each week (for months) provided us with a time to connect, share, and support each other through a remarkable time in our history.In essence, we were learning and teaching a research method while experiencing an added layer of meaning through a tumultuous time.We knew that we experienced something special that inspired an idea for these results.The COVID-19 pandemic was only one aspect of the direction for the findings of our study.As a research group, we also processed the protests in the United States and how antiracism and decolonization efforts were needed across society, including mental health.It is critical that the counseling profession addresses the needs of diverse clients by diversifying counselor education to create a more inclusive and welcoming learning environment.The pathway to more inclusivity is to understand that professional identity development looks and feels different to students and colleagues of minoritized identities.These diverse experiences need to be understood to diversify and enrich our collective vision of professional identity in counseling.Our content analysis findings demonstrated that diverse experiences of students and colleagues were missing from professional identity research.We decided to reach out to Counselor Education & Supervision with the idea for the professional identity special issue

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