The Truth About School Counseling

[00:00:00] Hey friends, Steph Johnson here, founder of School for School Counselors and a full-time school counselor, just like you. I'm so excited to welcome you to the first episode of the School for School Counselors podcast! And since you're here, that officially already makes us besties. I'm going to give you a behind the scenes idea right now, and that is: I've tried recording this episode about 400 times already. And part of the problem is it's really strange sitting here talking to a microphone instead of my people. And I also think that I just don't love the sound of my voice. I think that's probably pretty universal for all of you. So bear with me as I get through this, I'm just going to push through this episode now. This is do or die time: I'm not rerecording this again. I'm just going for it. So I hope you enjoy the ride. I'm so glad you're here to take this weird wacky journey with me! 

[00:00:52] I just want to tell you about our perspective in School for School Counselors and why we exist and how we're a little bit different from all the other amazing school counseling groups out there. 

[00:01:05] We strongly believe that we're smarter and stronger together. We do not seek to anoint any one person with "expert" status. We think all of our situations, all of our resources, all of our campuses, are all very unique. And it would be a shame to stand up and say, "We know exactly how this is supposed to happen, "and try to teach it to everyone. That's just not how we roll. We want to be very collaborative with you. We want to construct the best options, and we've had so much fun doing it so far. If you haven't been part of our School for School Counselors Facebook group, man, you need to get over there! We have so much fun in there, such a great time, and we'd love to welcome you. And put "podcast" somewhere on your join request and we'll make sure we get in super fast. 

[00:01:57] The second thing that we do a little bit differently is we strive to bring you some truly unique resources. Now, we don't provide lessons, believe it or not. And the reason we don't do that is because it's not our forte. There are lots of other really talented folks out there providing that kind of stuff, and we hope to bring some of that to you here in the near future. But what we want to look at is crowdsourcing the fundamentals. We want to provide the information that your grad school forgot. We want to provide it in a way that's a little more in depth and immediately applicable. than, you know, watching a YouTube video or something like that. We've offered a lot of super innovative programs since we started in 2020. We have our School for School Counselors Mastermind group, which is an amazing group of people who are just about the smartest people you've ever met. 

[00:02:49] We have our "Get the Job!" Interview prep program, we have tons of different downloads and guides and workshops and free summits that we've provided over the years, and we show absolutely no sign of slowing down. We love serving. We love helping and we are going to continue to do that as much as humanly possible. 

[00:03:10] But the last difference between us and most school counseling groups that you might be affiliated with is that we recognize- and are very real about- the fact that school counseling is almost nothing like what you were told it was going to be, right? 

[00:03:27] You go to grad school, you are told about comprehensive programs, counseling theories, counseling techniques, best case scenarios, right? And then you set foot on your first campus and you realize, "Ooh, goodness gracious: this is way different than when anybody told me!"

[00:03:49] You have a bajillion meetings, you're maybe facilitating 504s, you're in charge of registration, testing, all these other things that nobody else either wants to do or knows how to do. And then you're trying to fit in the time to actually talk to kids. And a lot of the time when we talk about our roles and responsibilities in school counseling, we still tend to talk about them from a perfect world scenario. And I think that really does us a disservice. I think we have to get real about what we're working in, what our circumstances look like, and how we can use those for the better. And so that's what our focus really is here at School for School Counselors. We know school counseling is super unique, and you weren't trained in all the things you're being asked to do. And so we want to come in and help with that. 

[00:04:40] You know, to be a great school counselor, you gotta have a lot of patience, you gotta have a lot of grace, you did have a lot of gumption. And we have to be really careful that we don't let ourselves get tangled up in the shoulds. I should be seeing more students. I should be running a more comprehensive program. I should feel more respected at work. 

[00:04:59] There are all these ideas floating around about what school counselors should be. But we're forgetting one very important point. And that is that we are paid to follow directions. We are paid to fulfill the responsibilities that are assigned to us. In these perfect world scenarios, it sounds as though, you know, the school counselor has almost ultimate autonomy in what they do. And when we graduate grad school, we go into the field expecting that's what it's going to look like: we're going to be respected as a professional in our field, perhaps respected as a sort of authority- right?- in our area... but often that's not the case. And so even though we shouldn't ever stop striving to get better, looking toward progress and improvement for our programs and our campuses, we also have to be really careful that we don't start to ruminate. Right? We don't get bogged down in the muck of the negative thinking and lose our spark for what we do, and the reason that we started school counseling in the first place. 

[00:06:05] So our goal is to help school counselors stay on fire, ready to make an impact, and not easily get turned by that negativity. We want to collaborate. We want to advocate. We want to inspire change from the inside out. We have lots of ideas about how that can happen, and we are so excited to share them all with you. 

[00:06:26] And our goal through this podcast, and through everything else that we do in our ecosystem, is to provide collaboration, support, and empowerment for you in the real, messy and amazingly fulfilling world of school counseling. 

[00:06:41] So you'll see through our next episodes, we are very down to earth about this. We are never going to lecture at you for not running, you know, a RAMP oriented program. We're not ever going to be upset with you for not running a true comprehensive school counseling program. We get it. We get as close as we can, right?

[00:07:01] We throw that dart as hard as we can and as close to the target as we can. We're going to keep trying every day to hit that bullseye. 

[00:07:10] Anyhow. I'm so glad you're here with me at this podcast. I can't wait for you to hear another episode. I've been on my best behavior for this episode. I have been known to be slightly opinionated about school counseling, and in some ways, and with some thoughts, that you might not expect. So come back with me: experience all we have to offer. My team and I are ready and willing to support you. And again, if you haven't joined our Facebook group yet, what are you waiting for? Get over there. We're ready to greet you, we're ready to get to know you, and we're ready to collaborate with you and be inspired. All right, y'all- have the BEST day! I'll talk to you again soon.