NCE Study Guide: Exam Prep & Practice Test Questions for the National Counselor Exam

I had a nice 17 year break from my graduation so I really needed to study for the NCE and happy to report I passed on my 1st try : )Don't ask me why, after I graduated with my masters in counseling psychology that I technically could not take the NCE until I accumulated my 3000 post grad hours. I ended up working for 17 years and later in life decided to take this path. There is a hidden rule in my state where, only if the university allows you, when you graduate, you can take the NCE but even if you pass it doesnt count BUT after you get your 3000 post grad hours; then our state says, ok we accept your NCE score. This rule was not in place when I graduated in 2002 so I could not even register to take my NCE until I finished my 3000 post grad hours AND the DCCA finished "processing" my application and all the required documents. The DCCA lost papers; I had to call multiple times to get them to send me one of the documents to have initialed; they sent it after 3 weeks and forgot to include my origonal document! Every time I would call the DCCA it would be 30 min - 60 min on hold and there was a Hawaiian song, yes one song played on loop and it had a long pause at the end which made me think an operator picked up. I had an operator put me on hold and hang up or after explaining my situation only to get the answer: your application is being processed. Also CUH was extremely not helpful in giving me any advice, took over 3 months to get needed documents from them.Reading through made me realize how some facts are good to know off the top of your head but the amount of mind-numbing facts that really don't seem important to being a licensed mental health worker. There are theories with multiple steps and some of those steps have multiple sub sets and the amount of acronyms for organizations that accomplished whatever in some year before I was born. And sorry but I dont care of some organization was influenced by previous organization or if some theorists took some ideas from another or disagreed etc. I need my license! Any robot can regurgitate these facts and have no idea how to interact with or help other sentient humanoids! But if you, like me, find yourself having to jump through this particular hoop in life; then read this book and do the practice quizes etc.So in conclusion, if you have to read this book; I feel for you! Also, the photo of the lighthouse does not inspire me to read multiple psychological facts and concepts...

When i was studying for the NCE i used this book along with a couple others. I found it so useful and informative! I love the format and how easy it was to carry around with me! I passed my exam on the first try. I think this book was a large part of that.

I didn’t use this book but was recommended The Counselor’s Encyclopedia which is the same price and way more pages. This book only has 125 pages and overall is probably not the most comprehensive guide I need.

The pages of the book is quite good quality, as I use my markers and color pens, it does not overflows through the page. I put in the pictures of the 11th and 12th pages so you could see that. So far I enjoy going through it, as it is very easy to follow, and really is a good review of information that been studied in the past couple of years.

I found the categorizing - test subject areas, five areas for all questions, and their subsequent descriptions very helpful. Counseling Theories were presented in an easy-to-memorize manner, the practice tests and question with answer explanations very much gave me an idea what to expect from the NCE. The Test-Taking Strategies were very helpful as well. My confidence with taking the NCE has very much grown.

A good read, well written, and the topics it DID cover were very well handled. The problem is that it did not review everything that was on the test! Definitely don’t use this as your ONLY study material.

While I would make sure to get at least a couple study sources, this book was great and helped me pass the NCE on the first try! It has mostly summary content with a decent amount of practice questions for each section.

I thought that this review was very comprehensive and definitively helped me to raise my score on the exam. Before buying this book I only got about 50% of the practice test questions correct, after using this book I got about 91% of the questions on the actual test correct. I found that its review of the material was well-grounded in what was actually covered by the exam. It also provided objectively better answer explanations in the practice test questions than competitors did, further helping me to understand, holistically, the things that I did not remember, not just the things I already knew. 10 out of 10 would recommend and use again.