Educational psychologists work mostly in elementary and secondary school classrooms. They also may work in other settings such as colleges, consulting organizations, corporations, industry, the military, and religious institutions. Other career tracks within educational psychology include being a school psychologist or a school counselor. A school psychologist works with students, teachers, parents, and administrators to resolve students' learning and behavior problems. They evaluate the effectiveness of academic programs, behavior management procedures, and other services provided in school setting.
School counselors help people to accommodate to change or to make changes in their lifestyle.
They use techniques such as interviewing and testing to advise people how to deal with problems of everyday living. They work in places like university counseling centers, hospitals, high schools, and individual or group practices. The debate over the relative influences of heredity and environment still concerns educational psychologists today as it did in earlier times. Rene Descartes believed that knowledge was derived from the ideas with which people were born, rather than experience. Englishman John Locke had a dramatically different position, stating that children begin life as a tabla rasa or blank slate, and all learning results from experience.