My First Counseling Job

by Patrick O'Connor, Ph.D.

Like any other brand-new school counselor, I was eager to put my new license to work and save boatloads of students from life’s perils. That can be the only reason I eagerly accepted an invitation to interview for a job in a school district I had never heard of. Metro Detroit is an amalgamation of cities joined together by one of the largest highway systems in the world, where getting from one end of town to another was designed to be a breeze. Not knowing where this was suggested an exciting opportunity of exploration, a sojourn perhaps to the west side of the city, a part I wasn’t all that familiar with.

Not exactly. The directions I was given over the phone by the superintendent’s office (right—no phone apps, no MapQuest) suggested I was heading well north of Detroit, past even the outdoor music venue most Detroiters considered “out there.” So convinced I had to be close, I stopped at two party stores and asked for directions. Neither shopkeeper had heard of this place.

60 miles and eighty minutes later, I arrived for the interview, less in the mood to talk about meeting the need of today’s young people, and more in the mood for a Lawrence of Arabia sized glass of lemonade. The superintendent’s first question was how I felt about relocating from Detroit. Speaking with a candor I never knew I had, I responded by saying that, since we had just moved into our first home, I had no intention of moving anywhere. 

The silence after my answer was enough to suggest I could just head back in the car for the trek home, but these, I would soon find out, were farm people, where candor was a way of life. A few questions later led to a job offer that included about a 50% salary raise over my current private school teaching job (private school parents—you have Nothing to complain about when it comes to small class size and individualized attention. Nothing). I’d likely spend a chunk of that on new cassette tapes for the drive, but it was a chance to practice my craft.

Two-and-a-half months into the commute, there were still mornings I was convinced I had missed the third traffic signal (yup—sixty miles and three traffic signals) to turn into the high school. This was particularly compounded one day when I made the turn, went past the elementary school, parked my car in a very familiar parking lot, and walked in the door to the staff room to say good morning to…

…a complete room of strangers. Seriously. People I had never met before in my life were in a school that was still new enough to me, I thought I somehow went to the wrong building. That, or I was living an amazing episode of The Twilight Zone.

The mesmerism was broken when the door opened and my counseling colleague came in. He was a great guy and incredibly sharp, so it only took the look on my face for him to say “Thought you were in the wrong building? Welcome to the first day of deer hunting season.”

I’d heard stories of how schools in northern Michigan were empty, if not closed, on November 15^th, because they didn’t have enough teachers—or sometimes students—to stay open, but all these sweater-wearing women with knitting bags made the theory all too real. The ride home was filled with anticipation of what else I would see, having taken a job far beyond the shadows of the rubber-band freeway system of Detroit.