PRAXIS 5421 Practice Test (Answered)
120 Multiple Choice Questions and
Correct Answers With Rationale.
Updated Fall 2024/2025.
Which legislative act replaced the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) (PL 107-110) ?
A. Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) (PL 114-95)
B. Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) (PL 101-336)
C. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA) (PL 93-380 § 513)
D. Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004 (IDEIA) (PL 108-446)
Correct Answer: A
Option (A) is correct. In 2015, ESSA replaced the NCLB Act. ESSA allows states more freedom in setting
educational goals and has fewer restrictions on how students are tested than NCLB did.
Which of the following provide the most convincing evidence of program effectiveness?
A. Advisory council feedback reports
B. Achievement-related data
C. Management agreements
D. Parent surveys
Correct Answer: B
Option (B) is correct. Achievement-related data are the most direct measures of program success.
If a professional school counselor makes a judgment about a student to a teacher and the student finds
out, which TWO of the following are likely outcomes?
A. The student will no longer trust the school counselor.
B. The student will gradually confide in the counselor more and more.
C. The student will intentionally misrepresent himself or herself in counseling in an attempt to be judged
positively.
D.
Correct Answer: A,C
Options (A) and (C) are correct. If students feel a school counselor is making judgments about them, they
will not trust the school counselor and will be less open and honest with the counselor to avoid being
judged negatively.
Of the following, where is the best place to store student grade data?
A. A word-processing document located on the principal's personal hard drive
B. A spreadsheet located on the professional school counselor's personal hard drive
,C. A student information system
D. On paper in a locked file cabinet
Correct Answer: C
Option (C) is correct. Student grades are best housed in an electronic student information system, where
security needs can be met and the files can be backed up. Files on one staff member's hard drive cannot
be accessed by all the authorized persons that need them, and paper files can easily be destroyed if
there is an accident or local disaster.
Which of the following data would document time devoted to the delivery component of an effective
school counseling program?
A. Daily attendance rate of students
B. Percentage of time the counselor spent on administrative duties
C. Number of consultative services provided to colleagues and parents
D. Mean test scores
Correct Answer: C
Option (C) is correct. Whereas the other options list important factors to consider in terms of the whole
school, only (C) is a delivery component in the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) model.
In conducting an annual needs assessment, it is most important to analyze data from which of the
following sources?
A. College entrance exam databases
B. State testing databases
C. School district administrators
D. Students, parents, teachers, and community stakeholders
Correct Answer: D
Option (D) is correct. A needs assessment should include input from students, parents, teachers, and
community stakeholders.
The best way for a counselor to address the problem of one student monopolizing group counseling time
is to
A. tell the student that his or her participation in the group will be terminated if the behavior does not
change
B. have the group examine the student's behavior in a productive and nonthreatening manner
C. ask the student politely to allow the other group members to speak more frequently
D. discuss the student's monopolizing behavior with the student outside of group time
Correct Answer: B
Option (B) is correct. The best way for the student and his or her peers to learn from the experience of
the inappropriate interaction is for them to examine the behavior and its implications in a
nonthreatening manner. The other choices either do not take advantage of the group setting to help all
,students involved or are offensive and nonproductive to the treatment of the student who is
monopolizing group time.
Which of the following is a responsibility of a guidance advisory committee (GAC) ?
A. Reviewing counseling program data and activity outcomes to make recommendations to the
counselor
B. Evaluating the counselor's professional activities
C. Reporting recommendations about counseling plans to administrators
D. Sharing the work of the committee with the local media
Correct Answer: A
Option (A) is correct. A GAC is commonly charged with the task of reviewing program data and making
recommendations based on its evaluations. GACs typically do not evaluate counselors' professional
activities, report directly to administrators, or disclose counseling work to the media.
Which of the following approaches takes into consideration the counseling components that are shared
by all cultural groups?
A. Etic
B. Emic
C. Egocentric
D. Ethnic
Correct Answer: A
Option (A) is correct. An etic approach considers characteristics presumed to be shared by all cultural
groups, such as identity development, acculturation, and social class differences (Lee et al., 2007).
Which of the following is an appropriate reason for a school counselor to disclose information that a
student has shared?
A. The student has a serious contagious disease, but no one is at risk of contracting the disease.
B. A concerned teacher asks about the welfare of the student.
C. The counselor is assisting the student in gaining employment.
D. The counselor is assisting in the prevention of imminent danger to the student or to others.
Correct Answer: D
Option (D) is correct. School counselors have a duty to warn if there is potential harm to the student or
to others.
According to the National Career Development Association's guidelines, competencies appropriate for
students at all levels include
A. advanced skill development and focused training
B. self-exploration, consideration of values and life roles, and portfolio development
, C. self-knowledge, educational and occupational exploration, and career planning
D. identification of occupational preferences and clarification of career and lifestyle choices
Correct Answer: C
Option (C) is correct. When integrating career development guidelines across various levels, counselors
should identify developmentally appropriate goals and interventions that will serve a person throughout
the life span. Self-knowledge, educational and occupational exploration, and career planning are
competencies that are included at the elementary, middle, and high school levels, as well as in
adulthood.
Ms. Barber, a counselor, is conflicted because she is working with a student, Lucy, whose lifestyle is not
consistent with her own religious values. She occasionally gives advice to Lucy about ways to improve
her lifestyle. According to the American School Counseling Association (ASCA), the school counselor is
violating which of the following ethical principles?
A. Avoiding dual relationships with students and school personnel
B. Facilitating brief and solution-focused therapy
C. Informing parents, guardians, and/or the appropriate authorities when a student poses a danger to
self or others
D. Respecting students' values and beliefs and not imposing one's own values and beliefs on them
Correct Answer: D
Option (D) is correct. According to the ASCA, school counselors must respect students' values and
beliefs; counselors cannot impose their own beliefs on students and their families.
A counselor records time spent in the areas of classroom guidance, individual planning, system support,
and responsive services and compares the use of time to a state plan. The purpose of the documentation
and comparison is
A. collaboration
B. management
C. accountability
D. planning
Correct Answer: C
Option (C) is correct. Documentation of time spent in various activities is for the purpose of
accountability.
According to the American School Counselor Association (ASCA), which TWO of the following are true
about romantic relationships between school counselors and students?
A. Such a relationship is permissible if the student is over 18 and consenting, even if a student still
attends the school where the counselor works.
B. Such a relationship is permissible only if the student no longer attends where the school counselor
works and no harm will come to the student.
C. Such a relationship is never appropriate if the student currently attends the school where the
counselor works.
D. Such a relationship is never appropriate, even if the student no longer attends the school where the
counselor works.
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