Blog #9 Nakia Eckert

                Reading the Chapter 9 vignette brought me back to my own high school days, when drug and alcohol use was rampant and resulted in permanent consequences for many of my fellow students. Many teachers and counselors seemed to wash their hands of any problem and left it up to the parents to educate and prevent us from getting involved with drugs and/or alcohol. The problem was that either the parents decided to turn a blind eye and leave it up to the school to be an enforcer or were not involved enough in their children’s lives to notice an issue. When all parties involved pass the buck and say “that’s not my job”, they end up leaving teenagers on an island, forced to educate themselves about right versus wrong. It has been proven that teens are much more likely to make reckless decisions, especially when adults in their lives are not influential. This vignette made me think of the chapter that discussed that it takes a village to raise a child. When each person in a child’s life gives them a snippet of educational information in a kind and caring way, they are much more likely to make a healthy choice than if they are only hearing it from one person and being ignored by the rest. I do view the School Counselor as an educator, but it is not their primary and sole responsibility to educate all school district constituencies about every issue that goes on in the school setting and in the community. That is everyone’s job and the School Counselors can be the ones who facilitate that process.

                I do, however, feel that it is the responsibility of School Counselors to be the pioneers for this education process. School Counselors are the adults in the building who should be the primary advocates for the students as well as have the strongest ties to community stakeholders. Because of this role, educating adult stakeholders is an extremely important component of the entire process. “There is no shortage of ways to help our adult partners develop a greater understanding and appreciation of young people, schools, and the educational process. As the counselor of a CSCP, you are aware of systemic issues that impede our students’ potential for success, as an educator, you can see that many of these issues can be addressed through educating our adult partners” (Dollarhide & Saginak, 2012, p. 157).

                Lastly, I wanted to mention that I had the opportunity to attend an Advisory Council meeting for the Career and Technical Programs at Octorara High School. It was a great experience and I got to put our class discussions and CSCP project into a real-world context. When dealing with state-articulated credits, these types of meetings are mandatory, and the school is also going through an audit in a few weeks so there was a lot of data that was shared as well as evidence-based outcomes. I will continue to stay involved with this Advisory Council as it really enhances and drives home much of the work we are doing in class this semester.

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