School for School Counselors Podcast
School counseling is one of the most rewarding professions on the planet, but also one of the most intense and misunderstood. Most school counseling resources continue to focus on ultra-filtered, perfect-world examples of school counseling instead of the raw, real-world realities of the profession we love: that’s why we created this podcast. The School for School Counselors podcast is for school counselors working their hearts out while fearing they’ll never meet the expectation of a “perfect” comprehensive program. It’s for school counselors who are feeling frustrated, discouraged, or misunderstood. And it’s for those of us who just simply LOVE working in and thinking about school counseling because we want to learn, grow and inspire positive change in students. If you’ve been looking for a circle of school counselor colleagues who just GET IT, and if you’re not afraid to be REAL about things like comprehensive school counseling programs, data-driven school counseling, and the joys and real challenges of the modern school counselor’s role on campus, you’ve come to the right place.
Recent Episodes
207
Aug. 3, 2026
Why You Need Sanity-Based School Counseling
School counseling on paper and school counseling in real life are not the same job. You were trained to support students, build relationships, and run a comprehensive program. Then you walked onto a campus with an impossible caseload, unclear expectations, constant interruptions, and demands coming from every direction. So you did what good school counselors do: you worked harder. But what if effort was never the missing piece? In this episode, I'm looking at: three places where school counse...
206
July 27, 2026
When Good School Counselors Go Quiet
The educational system doesn't need to plot to keep you quiet. It just needs to keep you tired. And after that, the silence takes care of itself. A few nights ago, I watched over a hundred school counselors simultaneously go quiet. It was weird. They'd been engaged in my presentation. They were animated and alive. The conversation was popping. But then... I changed the subject from talking about the problems to talking about what to do next... and suddenly the entire room changed. Som...
205
July 13, 2026
You’re Planning Your School Counseling Program Backwards
Most school counselors plan their programs in the same order they were taught: start with the data, identify the need, choose the intervention, and try to make the model fit. But that's exactly why so many carefully built plans fall apart by October. In this episode, Steph explains why school counselors may be planning their programs backwards — and the two questions that should come before goals, calendars, initiatives, or action plans. Because the goal is not to reach May with the most comp
204
July 6, 2026
What Makes You a Remarkable School Counselor?
Most school counselors can describe what they do all day. Crisis response. Small groups. Student check-ins. Parent calls. Schedule changes. Behavior support. Data meetings. The fifty small things that happen before 9:00 a.m. But ask a school counselor what makes them remarkable, and things can get quiet fast. In this episode, Steph talks about why it can be so hard to name the specific instincts, patterns, and abilities that make you unusually effective in your role. This is not about g...
203
June 29, 2026
The Student Mental Health Bot Nobody Asked For
Last week, we looked at what happens when schools finally put a price tag on the mental health fallout of social media. This week, we're looking at the strange second half of that story. If technology is part of the problem... why are some schools turning to even more technology as the solution? Across the country, districts are adopting AI-powered mental health tools that monitor students, flag concerning behavior, and even carry on conversations with kids in emotional distress. The marketin
202
June 22, 2026
Social Media Drama Just Got a Price Tag
Social media drama has a price tag now. A Kentucky school district recently settled a lawsuit against social media companies for approximately $27 million, arguing that the platforms helped create a student mental health burden schools have been forced to absorb. But school counselors didn’t need a lawsuit to know this was costing something. The screenshots. The group chats. The parent emails. The cyberbullying investigations. The friendship blowups that started online and landed in your offi...
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