The opportunities and role of the counselor in education are expanding, partially due to the increasing numbers of Mexican American students and their demands for equal education. While many researchers have traced the problem of poor education for Mexican American children to their cultural and family background, both teachers and counselors have contributed to the situation by setting lower expectations for Mexican American students and by using rigid "tracking" systems which tend to limit student achievement. One much-heralded approach to the problem is bilingual/bicultural education. Another approach is using counselors, preferably bilingual, at all educational levels and expanding the counselor role to include parent orientation, community liaison, and student placement, as well as helping the student with problems. In particular, the counselor can assist with the growing numbers of elementary aged minority students who exhibit high anxiety and low self-concept, and the "alingual" or "bicultural illiterate" student. Currently, counselors are often misused by the institutions that employ them, but they are generally well trained. Anglo counselors must be versatile, skilled, more culturally aware of their minority students, and must know which methods work best with those clients. There are implications for both inservice and institutional training programs. (SB)