The chat room posting started off easily enough, in a way I’d seen a thousand times before. “I’m new to the profession, and interviewing this week. What questions should I expect?”
I provided what I have long believed to be a helpful answer. “They will want to know about your college and career counseling curriculum. If they don’t ask about it, that’s a question you should ask them.”
I moved on to other things, but saw the author had responded. “Thanks. And what college and career counseling curriculum would you suggest?”
And suddenly, 2026 was 1984 all over again.
That’s the year I earned my Master’s degree in Counseling, with absolutely no references—in coursework or practicum—to college counseling. The moment I was in the field, I knew this was a gaping error, so I put together a curriculum for a graduate course in college counseling. Convinced this was just an innocent oversight, I sent it to the department chair of my newly minted alma mater, and even followed up with a phone call when I didn’t hear back.
I don’t think he could have been more surly. “We don’t have room in the program for any new courses” he growled, with a brevity that suggested the entire conversation was over.
That has more or less been the story for the past 40 years—we don’t have room, it’s not real counseling, college isn’t for everyone. Even when CACREP moved up the number of required credit hours for certification, college counseling got short shrift.
So here we still are, lots of new counselors who come running out of their office doors after just 15 minutes on the job, wondering just how to do this college counseling thing.
OK. One more time then.
Yes, counseling has a curriculum A good deal of counseling work is crisis management, but counseling also has a skill set to teach all students—stress management, problem solving, self-esteem, academic success, and postsecondary planning.
College counseling is part of that curriculum Of the 500+ counselor training programs in the US, last count showed less than two dozen had a course in college counseling, and about half spent no more than 15 clock hours on the subject if it was mentioned at all.
Not everyone needs to go to college… but everyone deserves to explore what college is, and how it can advance their goals, needs, and interests. That’s the goal of the college counseling curriculum.
This can’t be effectively learned on the job Counselors don’t learn crisis management, conflict resolution, or anger management on the job. Why is college counseling different?
College counseling isn’t just for elite high schools I’ve worked at elite high schools, and while I helped those students, most of them would have found college without me (yes, I said it). If anything, college counseling is more needed in high schools that serve low-income and first-generation students, since their college knowledge curve is more steep.
There’s room in grad schools to teach this Most counseling programs have 7 or 8 courses in Psychology, ample room to reorganize that content and make room for a college counseling course.
A grad school curriculum exists Courses in college counseling exist, and have specific outcomes. Take a look at this one.
School counselors have many goals, including the desire to make the world a better place. Start the new year off on the right foot, call your grad school, and tell them to offer a required course in college counseling. Don’t make the next generation of counselors learn the hard way, if indeed they learn at all.
