While many outside of America’s public schools may not be aware, this week, February 3-7, marks National School Counseling Week. As a higher education professional, and as a parent, this week serves as an opportunity to recognize the incredible impact that school counselors make on students, families, and communities – especially for neurodivergent students with learning differences like dyslexia, ADHD, and autism – whom we exclusively serve at Landmark College on our Putney, Vermont campus, online, and through our Bay Area Success Center in California. Beyond celebrating the profession, however, it’s also a reminder that we as parents, citizens, and fellow education professionals have an obligation to speak up and advocate for the critically important work our school counselors perform, often under adverse conditions and unsustainable caseloads.
Appropriately, the theme for this year’s National School Counseling Week is “School Counselors: Helping Students Thrive.” At Landmark, we see the product of exactly that every day. School counselors play an essential role in helping neurodivergent students to identify and build upon their strengths as learners and communicators. We know at Landmark that taking a strengths-based approach is essential to help neurodivergent students develop self-advocacy skills that college, employers, and adulthood will require of them, regardless of the exact path they take. While there are a range of post-secondary paths for each student – neurodivergent or neurotypical – as admissions professionals, we see the dedication and personalization required of counselors when it comes to determining whether a student would be the right fit for Landmark College.
But to help every student thrive, we must do more to support school counselors. Today’s students face multiple crises that are upending public K-12 and higher education alike – from Covid learning loss and school closures to the rise of social media and the subsequent rise in adolescent mental health challenges – and yet school counselors are often underpaid and overworked. The American School Counselors Association reports that, today, the average school counselor manages a caseload of 385 students, a whopping 54% higher than what is considered the appropriate ratio of 250:1. Just two out of 50 states – Vermont and New Hampshire – have a ratio of below 250:1.
On a personal level, I am fortunate to live and work in both of those states – and I see the impact of appropriate counselor staffing ratios as a parent. While my son is only seven years old, he has already developed a crucial relationship with his school counselor, Becky Kohler, at Chesterfield Central School. Ms. Kohler has quickly become a trusted friend of and advocate for our child, helping him to develop successful traits as a student, and helping us as parents to better support him in home-to-school transitions and vice versa. Every parent, and every child, deserves this sort of individualized and caring attention – and it will save our education system costs over the long-term. But to make that a reality, we need to do more to recruit and retain high-quality school counselors in every school district so that staffing ratios can reach best-practice levels.
In addition to our continued advocacy for the counseling profession, Landmark College is proud to offer a number of resources that we would encourage counselors, special educators, parents, and students themselves to utilize. Examples range from information and learning modules for parents with a neurodivergent child on our family resource hub to resources for students from our Success Center, and professional development for educators through our Landmark College Institute for Research and Training. At Landmark College we know that most of our students would not be here without a school counselor who supported them. This National School Counseling Week, and always, we’re proud to support the school counselors shaping the lives of our students, and other children nationwide.
Michael Stefanowicz, M.Ed. serves as the Vice President for Enrollment Management at Landmark College, leading admissions and financial aid strategies for the Putney, VT campus and online programs. Mike presents at national and regional conferences on a range of topics including neurodivergent student success in the college search, secondary school curriculum, and enrollment and marketing strategies. Mike and his wife, Nicole, live in southwestern New Hampshire with their first-grader, Patrick; preschooler, Calliope; and Landmark College certified therapy dog, Waffle.