What’s Going On in the Counselor’s Office?

Abstract

School administrators are not always as familiar as they might be with the education and training of school counselors. As a result, school counselors may be assigned non-counseling activities such as supervision or paperwork tasks that would be more closely suited to the duties of an assistant principal or member of the clerical staff. These non-counseling duties are time-consuming and allow school counselors less time to spend with the students assigned to them. Resources and creative thinking are needed to reduce or eliminate many of the non-counseling functions that school counselors are required to assimilate into their workday, so that they can spend their time helping students. This case study examines the dilemma faced by the principal of a large high school as she confronts an unhappy counseling staff and the culminating desire of one school counselor to leave the profession and return to the classroom. She realizes the difficulties have been growing for some time and she has not adequately addressed the counselor’s concerns. Upon overhearing a hallway discussion about one of her counselors, she decides it is time to find out what is going on in the counselor’s office.