Greetings from Guidance

As seems to always be the case, the pace in the Guidance Department has been frantic. While the surprises in the counselor’s day are often unpredictable, the staff continues to work hard on a number of initiatives. We have been spending much of the fall, winter and early spring guiding students through the college application process. With the incredible effort of Jackie Birdsall, Judy Oulundsen and Barbara Horowitz, our office processed approximately 1940 applications as of the time of this writing, which is up from last year. But while it may often seem that the Guidance Department is all about course selection and college counseling, as most of you know, there are many programs, activities and services we offer. So as we wrap up much of the course selection process and we exit the home stretch of the college admission process, it might be helpful to highlight a few of our many other responsibilities and services.

Throughout the course of a school day, we welcome and expect that we will have students who drop in because they need someone to talk to. Because of the nature of our jobs and the size of our caseloads, we cannot engage in long-term therapeutic relationships with our students. However, as counselors, we do short-term, solution-focused interventions that help students through isolated situations and circumstances. When we determine that additional services and support are needed, we act as a referral service. We are fortunate to have counselors from both HopeWorks, and the Bridge Family Center to refer to, as well as being able to assist you in accessing other counseling services.

As a team we constantly evaluate the services we provide on a developmental level. As we work to become more efficient in our delivery of those services, we are initiating an increased number of workshops. This past fall, we worked with juniors and held workshops to help them with the college search process. In anticipation of post-high school planning next year, we also delved further into Naviance (our comprehensive online analysis and tracking program for post-high school planning and scheduling) with our sophomores by completing Do What You Are and Career Cruising, which allow students to link their personality types and their interests as they begin to explore possible career options.

Whether the guidance staff is giving a classroom presentation on career interests, helping a student resolve a conflict with a peer, working with a family on student motivational issues, assisting the Pupil Services Department with a Planning and Placement Team meeting (PPT), following up on an intervention suggested by the Student Assistance Team (SAT), meeting with a college admission representative, chairing a school committee to improve attendance, or holding a small group session on goal-setting, you can be assured that no one day is like any other!

As we move toward the summer, we encourage you to continue to see us as an important resource in your child’s development here at Hall and urge you to be in touch with us regarding any specific concerns you have. For those current 8th grade parents from KPMS who will be joining our community, please know that your children will be invited to attend the annual New Student Orientation on Thursday, August 28th before the rest of the student body returns.

The entire guidance staff wishes to thank the parent community for their support and participation in all of our evening programs. The attendance and response has been overwhelming and wonderfully positive. Finally, we wish everyone a safe and enjoyable vacation and we look forward to working with you in the fall, if not sooner!

Mark Wursthorn - Paul Ribeiro
School Counselors

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