Anonymous wrote:Are counselors required to send parents a message after they have met with your child in their counseling office?

We once received a typed letter sent with our child (no email) for a one time meeting with a few other students in the counselors office when a boy student in the class was acting violent. It was a situation where the school remained shut up. They should have removed the student immediately. They are lucky parents didn't file a lawsuit though we still could this many years later.

Anonymous wrote:Mother of a senior here. We had interaction with a counselor when my child was in K — was involved and helpful in dealing with an issue, and I credit her with having an important impact on getting my child off to a good start in school. We moved after K and then had limited contact with counselors until junior year of HS, when counselor was helpful in resolving scheduling issues— and really went to bat for my child to work out a good schedule.
So, for us they were good resources to have access to when needed, and I appreciate they were there. The fact that they weren’t always front and center was a reflection of the fact that we didn’t need them, and I assume they were helping the kids who did need them.
Also, while we didn’t have 1-1 interactions with all of them, they did sometimes teach lessons to my child’s class, especially in ES, so my child always knew who the counselor was.
So, thanks to the school counselors!

Yes. Their caseload is in the some hundreds. Would be surprised if they can recognize any student by name aside from the frequent fliers.

Mother of a senior here. We had interaction with a counselor when my child was in K — was involved and helpful in dealing with an issue, and I credit her with having an important impact on getting my child off to a good start in school. We moved after K and then had limited contact with counselors until junior year of HS, when counselor was helpful in resolving scheduling issues— and really went to bat for my child to work out a good schedule.
So, for us they were good resources to have access to when needed, and I appreciate they were there. The fact that they weren’t always front and center was a reflection of the fact that we didn’t need them, and I assume they were helping the kids who did need them.
Also, while we didn’t have 1-1 interactions with all of them, they did sometimes teach lessons to my child’s class, especially in ES, so my child always knew who the counselor was.
So, thanks to the school counselors!

Are counselors required to send parents a message after they have met with your child in their counseling office?

Hit or miss with counseling departments in MCPS.

Can’t say I knew the ES counselors. But from MS on, I’ve known the counselors well and feel like we’ve gotten great services. Two of my kids have already completed HS but i still have occasional contact with them.


I also know my kids teachers and principals. And my kids always had relationships with their counselors and school staff.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We love our high school counselor! She does regular check-ins and works with DS on his anxiety. She’s also helped mediate when we had a misunderstanding with a teacher. Happy he has a trusted adult in the school who knows him as more than just a student.

I wonder if the other 200+ students assigned to said counselor can say the same. If so, kudos to that counselor.

It would be awesome if the HS counselors would cycle through their assigned students, even if just for 20mins a couple times of year. Right now, unless the student goes to see the counselor for a specific purpose, their only interaction is when they show up in class for registration.

Most counselors would LOVE to have a few 20-minute sessions per school year with all 250-300 students on their caseload. But due to the outrageous amount of paperwork and other administrative tasks that go along with the job, this is a completely unreasonable expectation. In many schools, counselors are just seen as the “let’s throw them the tasks that nobody wants to do like 504s” employees. Time spent providing direct service to children is not a priority for the PTB.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We love our high school counselor! She does regular check-ins and works with DS on his anxiety. She’s also helped mediate when we had a misunderstanding with a teacher. Happy he has a trusted adult in the school who knows him as more than just a student.

I wonder if the other 200+ students assigned to said counselor can say the same. If so, kudos to that counselor.

It would be awesome if the HS counselors would cycle through their assigned students, even if just for 20mins a couple times of year. Right now, unless the student goes to see the counselor for a specific purpose, their only interaction is when they show up in class for registration.

Hm, I don’t think that’s necessarily true for all counselors and all kids. Ours do classroom lessons with different themes depending on the grade as well as individual meetings (college planning, freshmen meet and greet, etc.). I think the problem is a lot of people don’t fully know the roles of the counselor or just think they do schedule changes. That’s a very small part of their job. They run 504s and EMTs, conduct classroom lessons, individual sessions, and counseling groups, do academic advising, social/emotional counseling, college/career planning, write senior college recs, conduct credit checks, provide resources and referrals to families, and on and on. The giant caseloads make it hard to conduct quality, in-depth counseling with every student.

Both my kids have the same high school counselor (assigned by last name) and we truly think he is amazing. Both of my kids adore him (both with IEP's so have different strengths and weaknesses), but he is also great about communication with parents. Just this week he has been working with my son on a class change and he has kept me updated each time. Each time one of my children or myself emails him, he replies within hours and actually acts on whatever needs to be addressed. I truly feel like we hit the jackpot with him.

I didn't realize it was school counselor week, but I will be sending over a gift tonight.

Anonymous wrote:We love our high school counselor! She does regular check-ins and works with DS on his anxiety. She’s also helped mediate when we had a misunderstanding with a teacher. Happy he has a trusted adult in the school who knows him as more than just a student.

I wonder if the other 200+ students assigned to said counselor can say the same. If so, kudos to that counselor.

It would be awesome if the HS counselors would cycle through their assigned students, even if just for 20mins a couple times of year. Right now, unless the student goes to see the counselor for a specific purpose, their only interaction is when they show up in class for registration.

Anonymous wrote:Our ES counselor has a major attitude towards especially the moms at the school. If you want anything from her even to ask her a simple question, you need to praise her first. Teachers too don't seem to like her. She was a close friend to the Principal who has left but this counselor is still there. Luckily another counselor is also around and seems more approachable.

Sounds like the one at our immersion.

Our ES counselor has a major attitude towards especially the moms at the school. If you want anything from her even to ask her a simple question, you need to praise her first. Teachers too don't seem to like her. She was a close friend to the Principal who has left but this counselor is still there. Luckily another counselor is also around and seems more approachable.

PSA above from a School Counselor for School Counseling Week.

SC here. Thanks for remembering “our” week! (Most people don’t- busy time of year). It’s actually school counseling week, where we get to promote the value of a great school counseling practice in schools. But if you want to make it school counselors week and buy us lunch every day, you’re more than welcome to, lol.

Over the years I have noticed some SCs allocate a lot of their time to communication with parents by sending a lot of emails, spending a lot of time on the phone with parents, etc. I have noticed often these people don’t spend as much time with students and aren’t as much of a “kid favorite” as the SCs who maybe invest more of their energy into working with students and only communicate with parents if their is an emergency or a quick question over email. Different folks have different strengths and as long as the job is getting done I wouldn’t worry too much.

SC is a position not for the faint of heart and if your child really connects with their SC, this might be a good week to drop them a line to let them know you appreciate them. Just like administrators and teachers, many SCs have their eyes open to positions in the private sector that can use their skill set. Public Ed can be a war zone sometimes! The quick 1-2 line emails or notes from students can really go a long way especially on those busy, chilly, February days. Thank you SCs!

Most of the time parents don’t have much of a relationship with the child’s school counselor. Maybe an email here and there. What’s most important is that the student knows their school counselor.