Blog 12

When I shadowed an elementary school counselor a couple weeks ago, she had a half-day practicum student working with her who was currently employed at the high school level at Dallastown but was getting emergency certified in elementary school counseling so that she could take over a position that is freeing up in the spring. Seeing her desperation to learn the daily routine of an elementary school counselor made me happy that I am becoming dually certified for more reasons than one. I started out with that plan so that I could be more marketable: a phrase that I have heard from the peanut gallery of practicing school counselors/psychologists since I openly divulged my career path to the world. As I have gone through this program, however, I see that there are benefits to working with all ages of students. While career education is not my passion (anyone else hear that broken record?), while working with an older student in Theory and Practice II I realized that it is much easier for me to use our learned counseling skills on that age range.

My experience is dissimilar to Kanika’s experience in Dollarhide and Saginak’s (2012) text because I feel like this program has done its job of preparing me for the expected duties for counselors working in all age levels. Especially after hearing Eric and Laura’s input in class last night about their daily counseling duties, I can see myself working in any age level.

When I started reading Rayle’s (2006) article on a school counselor’s perception of how much they matter to the school, I was a little hesitant to read on for fear that I might want to drop out of the program. Instead, I took a solution-focused view on the topic and read through to the results. I did not find it surprising that Rayle found that school counselors matter most to their students and least to the teachers at the school (p. 211), because I feel that we have been prepared in some of our classes to expect teacher non-compliance with our counseling work. But instead of waving a white flag and solely taking the role of advocate for students and relinquishing the duty of working toward a positive systemic change, I think that we need to follow the advice of our classmates and professors. Amy suggested that we do not make any majors changes in the first year because it will almost guarantee animosity and frustration from coworkers. Nakia recommended that we focus on our personal wellness, no matter how busy we get, so that we can stay sane and work to our full potential. Keeping these pieces of advice in mind, I think that we can lead with our confident foot when we get hired as school counselors and become part of the team instead of another competitor in the school system.

Dollarhide, C.T., & Saginak, K.A. (2012). Comprehensive school counseling programs (2nd Ed.). New York: Pearson, Inc.

Rayle, A. (2006). Do school counselors matter? Mattering as a moderator between job stress and job satisfaction. Professional School Counseling, 9(3), 206-215.