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Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Laying the Foundation for K-12 Guidance and Counseling



In recent years we have all come to understand the significance of social-emotional learning to a student’s overall development and progress.  We have a better understanding of the emotional conditions that best support academic learning, among these being a sense of belonging, of mattering, of being known and understood by their teachers.  We also know that without self-regulation and resilience, a student is much less likely to learn and thrive in school or at home. Helping students feel safe AND helping them develop the dispositions, independence and sense of self that are needed to strengthen learning has become an important focus of our work across all of our grades.  At the same time, the social-emotional complexity of children has also increased, with greater numbers and percentages of students coming to school with anxiety or a history of trauma that can potentially interfere with learning and developing strong relationships necessary to it.  We see this rise in acuity among all demographics, among majority and minority members of racial and income-differing subgroups.

In responding to that need, the district leadership team has become increasingly aware of the importance of a coherent, coordinated K-12 guidance and counseling program. We have effective counseling programs, interventions, services, and supports in place within each of our schools, but we recognize the need to coordinate and facilitate those programs more closely K-12 in order to develop the coherent program that will be most effective for students and their families. Last spring, we created a K-12 Program Director position for Guidance and Counseling and hired Alicia Linsey to fulfill that role.  Alicia comes to us from Lexington High School, where, as a guidance counselor, she has played an important leadership role in national guidance counselor organizations.  She brings to Bedford a deep understanding of social-emotional learning, a strong commitment to equity, and a powerful set of skills and relationships derived from her years of experience running a college counseling business.

Knowing that the 6-12 Guidance and Counseling role has traditionally been a full-time position in itself, we are working to develop the necessary infrastructure to make the position and program development manageable and successful. Early this fall, then, we also created a K-5 Guidance and Counseling Coordinator position. Paula Francis-Springer, an exceptional counselor at the Davis school, has been appointed to this position.  Highly respected both for her direct service to students and families and for teaming with Principal Benoit as a school leader, she will continue her counseling work at Davis, but in addition will receive a stipend to help coordinate the K-5 aspects of this larger program.  These two positions will help us to become more effective in helping students navigate the transitions from 2nd to 3rd grade, from 5th to 6th grade, and from 8th to 9th grade.

The 18-19 school year will serve to lay the groundwork for this program. To that end, Alicia has arranged for quarterly K-12 Guidance and Counseling meetings. During these sessions, counselors are reviewing data, such as the Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) and presenting grade level programs and curriculum to the K-12 team with the purpose of collectively identifying common threads. Simultaneously, counselors will observe one another across the district to determine similar services and programs and identify areas of need. The K-12 meetings will also act as a conversational platform to begin to align department goals and objectives. While there is current parent outreach, the department aims to expand resources for parents/guardians. This concerted work will inform next steps for the 2019-2020 school year.

As a district, Bedford is deeply committed to the important work of social-emotional learning and pleased to announce this plan for strengthening our program.           MLS