IJSP Number 5, 2023

65 Systemic Issues, Acculturation, & Power Differential Under this first broad theme, four distinct sub-themes emerged: (1) systemic issues and legal restrictions imposed on international students; (2) acculturation; (3) addressing the power differential; and (4) taking a not knowing stance. First, many supervisors (50%) pointed out unique challenges faced by international students while navigating systematic and legal restrictions, as well as dealing with biases, microaggressions, and racism from some peers and clients. As an example, a supervisor (#2) shared “a white male client's microaggression toward (my supervisee) based on the supervisee’s physical appearance and accent. This reportedly made it hard for the supervisee to be present or empathize with some of this client's struggles.” Some supervisors (#7 and #9) also shared that “the racism/English-ism of the supervisee’s clients and the supervisee’s own self-doubt when faced with the racism from clients due to the supervisee’s own internalized racism and English-ism” as well as “what international supervisees can't surmount is institutional racism, and now the xenophobia that our [past] President is stirring up.” Further, a supervisor (#9) also elaborated: “When I worked in politically conservative states (two different ones), university counseling center clients tended to no-show after the first session, or even before the first session when they saw a "foreign" sounding name for their counselor. The staff at both of these centers tended to attribute no-shows to the international counselors' lack of skills rather than the racism of many clients…My [international] supervisees experience a great deal of racism and stress in their placements -- that has been heartbreaking to me.” The second subtheme is related to acculturation. Many supervisors (n = 6; 60%) in our sample also commented on topics related to assessing international supervisees’ acculturation. For example, a supervisor (#2) reported that some of their beginner international supervisees “takes longer to complete clinical notes, takes longer for them to voice ideas when having disagreement due to non- assertiveness, discomfort to articulate abstract emotional experiences, and/or taking more efforts for verbal expression of emotional experience.” Some supervisors (#5 and #7) reported that when an international trainee’s cultural identity is underdeveloped, the supervisee tended to see their international background as an obstacle and their internalized racism/English-ism would interfere with their development of the therapeutic working alliance and their self-efficacy as a therapist. A supervisor (#5) commented on the high-pressure regarding acculturation that international supervisees faced and how it impacted their clinical training, stating that “[the supervisee] trying too hard to be funny with clients and peers in the program which stemmed from some desires to fit-in”, and such desire to fit in or align with the dominant culture can impact the extent to which an international trainee might open up and take risks to discuss faults, errors, or confusion. Third, all of our supervisors (100%) noted the necessity to acknowledge the power differential with their international supervisees directly at the onset of the supervisory relationship and thereafter as needed. Some supervisors reported that they addressed the power differential differently with international trainees, as they became more mindful of and became more active in efforts to create growth-