Thirty-five novice counselors completed a Q sort that assessed their perceptions of what was most helpful about teachers of didactic classes in their master's degree program. Participants perceived teachers who used a contextual teaching pedagogy and had an authentic, empathic, and compassionate way of being as helpful to their learning.

A qualitatively modified Delphi approach was used to operationalize therapeutic presence so that it can be further studied as it relates to counselor training and therapeutic outcomes. A total of 12 counselors and counselor educators with over 200 combined years of experience in counselor education participated in this study. The results include a…