The Daily Activities of Counselors - Post 3

This week’s readings seemed to have a lot to do with the framework that school counselors bring into their everyday activities.  I felt a strong sense of connection to these readings as I was able to compare my recent experience of shadowing an elementary school counselor for a day with the suggestions made by Dollarhide and Saginak (2012) and the results of the study by Walsh, Barrett, and DePaul (2007).  Walsh, Barrett, and DePaul  found that “it is reasonable to conclude that newly hired, urban school counselors can practice in a way that is aligned with both new directions in the field of school counseling as well as the guidelines of the ASCA National Model Delivery System” (2007, p. 374).  While the counselor that I shadowed last week was practicing in a suburban setting and a school that was not RAMP certified, I also found that he was able to practice in a way that seemed to align both with new directions and the ASCA National Model.  I was encouraged to see that despite all of the urgent needs that arose throughout the day, all of the things that we did seemed to fit within the National (DAP) Model.  The DAP model comprises of “counseling, educating, consulting and collaboration, and leadership, coordination, and advocacy” (Dollarhide & Saginak, 2012, p. 66).  During my day with Mike (the school counselor I shadowed), I experienced him doing almost all of the aforementioned activities.  Here are a few examples of how I saw him fulfilling the DAP model activities:

Counseling: While observing a couple of students in a first-grade class, we noticed a student who became distressed and started crying because she had hurt her hands on the monkey bars at recess.  Mike took her back to his office and talked to her for a while and was able to calm her down and get her back to class.  Later on during the day, we saw the same girl smiling and having fun with her friends, and she had taken her Band-Aids off her hands.

Educating: Mike taught a guidance lesson to a first-grade class about how to handle disappointment in a positive way.  He teaches one classroom lesson in each classroom in the school once a month.

Consulting and Collaboration: Mike met with a learning support teacher to discuss possible interventions for a student that he had experience working with in the past.  He also touched base with another teacher about several students that she was concerned about and they discussed next steps in regards to interventions that they could try.

Leadership: Anytime we walked down a hallway, all of the students said “Hi” to Mike and wanted to get high fives from him.  Teachers and administrators also seemed to trust and appreciate his presence.  In fact, he is second-in-command whenever the school principal is absent as there is no assistant principal at the elementary level.

As Dollarhide and Saginak (2012) note, “balance among these activities does not mean “equal time,” but refers to the need to balance activities based on the needs of the partner being helped” (p. 66).  I can certainly say that Mike did not spend an equal amount of time doing the aforementioned activities, but he did balance the activities based on the needs of those he was helping.  Watching him in action was a rich and diverse experience for me, and one that I will not easily forget as I think more about CSCPs and the daily activities of counselors in the future.

References

Dollarhide, C.T., & Saginak, K. A. (2012). Comprehensive school counseling programs: K-12 delivery systems in action. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Walsh, M.E., Barrett, J.G., & DePaul, J. (2007). Day-to-day activities of school counselors: Alignment with new directions in the field and the ASCA national model. Professional School Counseling, 10 (4), 370-378.