As we return to our students, and during a time when the world is focused on goal setting, what better time to look at our profession and consider the big-picture changes that would improve college access.
Wider media coverage A poll (I can no longer locate) a few years ago asked adults what they thought the average tuition was at a four-year college. Their response was somewhere in the neighborhood of $35,000, when, in fact, the average at that time was around $12,500.
Major media outlets are laser-focused on about a dozen expensive colleges. They also happen to be very popular colleges, which only feeds the bias; if Harvard is hard to get into, paying attention to Harvard must be important in the college search.
The media is doing a disservice to the millions of students who won’t go there, since they don’t cover the non-Harvards of the world, even though those schools is where most of the learning and growing occurs. Our society will be serious about college access when the New York Times covers South Dakota State with as much vigor as it covers Princeton. Until then, the notion of college for only a select few remains.
Better counselor training The National Association for College Admission Counseling has stopped keeping track, but at last count a few years ago, only two dozen of the hundreds of counselor training programs in the US offered a course uniquely focused on college counseling. Some offer a postsecondary planning course that gives college advising about 12-15 hours of their time, but veteran counselors know that’s just enough information to know what you don’t know.
There are other obstacles keeping counselors from being more effective in college planning, but all the time in the world and a caseload of 50 won’t matter if counselors have never been fully trained in the rigors of college counseling. Grad programs can easily rearrange the content of the myriad mental health courses required for school counselors to create space for a focused college counseling class, and the curriculum already exists.
Ratios The mental health crisis brought on by COVID loosened up the purse strings for counselors, dropping caseloads in many states. Most are still not even close to the ASCA-suggested ratio of 250 to one—and, frankly, I’ve always thought that number was high—so more funding is needed. Then again, so are more counselors.
Duties Schedule changes, testing coordination, and discipline don’t belong in the counseling office, and counselors shouldn’t be used as last-minute substitute teachers since they “don’t have anything to do”. One way to help with high ratios is to make sure counselors spend their time on true counseling tasks. Parapros and substitute teachers can be just as effective with non-counseling duties.
Administrative training Too many administrators ascend to their position with no clue, or training, in what counselors do. State legislatures and NASSP would do well to require all administrators to attend a two-hour orientation on the role and duties of school counselors. The value of what counselors do shouldn’t change just because the building principal does.
Early introduction to college advising K-8 students don’t need college advising if their parents went to college. Every other student does. It’s more than possible to introduce the idea of college without causing undue stress or recommending specific colleges—I know, because it’s already happening. K-8 counselors need to pick up this mantle, remembering it’s just as important to educate the parents of first gens and low-income students on the virtues of college as a choice. Without them, the conversation with the students goes nowhere.
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