TEDish Talks & Restorative Justice

As President of Sigma Phi Upsilon, Seattle Pacific University’s chapter of Chi Sigma Iota, I plan a variety of meaningful events throughout the course of the academic year that benefit school counseling grad students, current educators and the community. One of our most popular events is our TEDish Talks. This year I decided to focus on the theme of restorative justice, due to the tremendous impact that restorative practices are making in schools. It’s also a tool that’s emerged at my internship site.

The counseling team read Restorative Circles in Schools and we have been implementing some of the practical suggestions from this awesome book (highly recommend).

We had incredible speakers at our TEDish Talks this year! When I recruited these speakers I had no idea that all of the information each speaker presented would build on top of the information by the other speakers. It was our third annual event and it was by far the best yet. We had the founder of the National Center for Restorative Justice, Nicholas Bradford, speak at our event which was an incredible honor. We ended the event by having 4 youth from Unleash The Brilliance speak about their experiences in school as “at-risk” students and what they could have used from a school counselor. It was a powerful way to wrap up the event. You can watch the entire event on YouTube. It’s definitely worth an hour and half of your time!

College Bound Scholarship

We have been doing High School and Beyond classroom guidance lesson mixed with College Bound Scholarship. My site supervisor has set a hefty goal of 100% return rate for college bound scholarship forms by 7th grade students. We want every student, even those who don’t qualify, to turn a form in. Her reasoning for this goal is there were this year she discovered 80 qualifying 8th grade students who hadn’t turned in the form in and it is great practice for our students to get accustomed to filling out scholarship forms.

This was a long lesson (50 minutes) and it was packed full of information for us to deliver. Therefore, it wasn’t the most interactive lesson except for the game at the end. The learning targets for this lesson are:

• To learn about high school
• To learn about options after high school (post-secondary options)
• To understand and fill out the College Bound Scholarship

Throughout the lesson I would ask for thumbs up, down, in-between to gauge student knowledge. We also included a video from College Bound describing what the scholarship is and how you qualify. Then, we handed the forms and walked students through what they would need to go home and fill out with their parent or legal guardian. We are requiring students bring the forms back the next day in order to receive their super cool College Bound Scholarship bracelet!

Check out our PowerPoint presentation: High School and Beyond 7th grade Lesson

Sexual Harassment Classroom Lesson

 

During the past 2 weeks we have gone into all of the 7th grade classes to present a lesson on sexual harassment. I had a BLAST teaching this lesson because it brought out some amazing discussion with the students. This was a 30-40 minute lesson and the learning targets for the lesson are:

We used a PowerPoint presentation to guide us through the lesson: Sexual Harassment Voyager 2017 Presentation. We also incorporated a few of the videos from the Second Step curriculum chapter on sexual harassment. The first video was real students describing uncomfortable situations, and we played this after the 5th slide. The second video was a scenario acted out by teens demonstrating a flirting couple and a sexually harassing encounter. We played this video multiple times and discussed it in great detail after presenting on the difference between flirting and sexual harassment.

This lesson was a true test to my classroom management skills and flexibility with gauging student engagement. There wasn’t a whole lot of time for pair-sharing or student led discussion, and due to the nature of the topic I’m not sure that would’ve been a great fit. However, I saw a tremendous growth in my classroom guidance skills and the qualitative data at our school shows that this is a crucial lesson.

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA National Standards for Students
  • PS:B1 Self-knowledge Application
  • PS:C1: Acquire Personal Safety Skills
• ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors 
  • B-SS 5. Demonstrate ethical decision-making and social responsibility
• ASCA Ethical Standards 
  • A.11 Bullying, Harassment and Child Abuse
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • IV-A-5. Classroom management
  • IV-B-1 a. Identifies appropriate curriculum aligned to ASCA Student Standards
  • IV-B-1c. Demonstrates classroom management and instructional skills

 

Missing Assignments Tracker

Missing Assignments Tracker is a form I created to help students who have fallen behind in their classes. We recently received the F and D list for the 7th grade, and it was daunting to say the least. I created this form for my organization group, but soon realized it’s a useful tool with all students in tier 2. With my guidance, the student fills it out by logging on to the student information system and seeing what assignments are missing. They then find out what they are still allowed to turn in, when they can turn it in by and once it’s handed in the teacher signs off on it.

 

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA National Standards for Students
  • A:A1 Improve Academic Self-concept
  • A:A2 Acquire Skills for Improving Learning
  • A:A3 Achieve School Success
  • A:B1 improve Learning
  • A:B2 Plan to Achieve Goals
• ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors for Student Success
  • B-LS 4. Apply self-motivation and self-direction to learning
  • B-LS 7. Identify long-and short-term academic goals
  • B-SMS 1. Demonstrate ability to assume responsibility
  • B-SMS 5. Demonstrate perseverance to achieve long- and short-term goals
  • B-SMS 6. Demonstrate ability to overcome barriers to learning
• ASCA Ethical Standards
  • A.1. Supporting Student Development
  • A.4. Academic, Career and Social/Emotional Plans
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • I-A-3. Barriers to student learning and use of advocacy and data-driven school counseling practices to close the achievement/opportunity gap
  • I-A-5. Individual counseling, group counseling and classroom instruction ensuring equitable access to resources promoting academic achievement, career development and personal/social development for every student
  • I-C-1. Every student can learn, and every student can succeed
  • II-C-3. Promotes and supports academic achievement, career planning and personal/social development for every student
  • IV-B-2. Facilitates individual student planning

Career Day

Career day is an incredible school-wide activity to offer students. It offers students insight into the world of work, expanding their ideas of what options are out there for them. It also connects community members with the school, and gives professionals the chance to inspire the future generation.

There are many ways to set up a career day at a school. My site supervisor has been putting on this school-wide activity for 3 years and has the logistics down to a science. The 6th and 7th graders would be participating in career day from 8:20-10 and 8th grade would be from 9:45-11:20. Speakers presented for 20 minutes, four different times, remaining in the same classroom while the students rotated classes. Therefore, each student saw four different speakers. The rotation schedule was created for the students and each teacher was to remain in their classroom providing assistance to the speaker.

6th and 7th grade had the following rotation schedule:

• Rotation # 1          8:20-8:40
• Rotation # 2          8:45-9:05
• Rotation # 3          9:10-9:30
• Rotation # 4          9:35-9:55

8th grade had the following rotation schedule:

• Rotation # 1          9:45-10:05
• Rotation # 2          10:10-10:30
• Rotation # 3          10:35-10:55
• Rotation # 4          11:00-11:20

We recruited 30 volunteer speakers in collaboration with the other counselors, the family advocate and all school staff. I was able to get a data scientist who is female and Asian American, a small business owner who is female and first generation Vietnamese American, a Costco travel manager who is Chilean American, a head chef who is African American, and a certified public accountant who is female and Asian American. It was important for us to bring in diverse speakers who are breaking down stereotypes and glass ceilings because our student body is very diverse. We wanted students to hear from people whom they can relate their own life stories to.

Speakers had the option to choose their time-slot and let us know what technology they’d be bringing. We had name tags made for them, snacks and coffee was set up in the staff lounge, student helpers (WEB leaders) took each speaker to their designated classroom and we had student photographers go into each classroom to get photos of the speakers. We gave each classroom teacher a thank you card to have the students sign and had them return it to us at the end of the day. We had photos printed and included them in the thank you notes to speakers. Lastly, we sent out a Career Day Evaluation – Google Forms to all the teachers for feedback. Overall, it was greatly received by teachers!

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA National Standards for Students
  • C:A1 Develop Career Awareness
  • C:B1 Acquire Career Information
  • C:C1 Acquire Knowledge to Achieve Career Goals
• ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors for Student Success
  • B-LS 10. Participate in enrichment and extracurricular activities
• ASCA Ethical Standards 
  • A.4.a. Collaborate with administration, teachers, staff and decision makers to create a culture of postsecondary readiness
  • A.4.b. Provide and advocate for individual students’ preK– postsecondary college and career awareness, exploration and postsecondary planning and decision making, which supports the students’ right to choose from the wide array of options when students complete secondary education
  • d. Provide opportunities for all students to develop the mindsets and behaviors necessary to learn work-related skills, resilience, perseverance, an understanding of lifelong learning as a part of long-term career success, a positive attitude toward learning and a strong work ethic
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • I-B-2. Serves as a leader in the school and community to promote and support student success
  • I-B-4. Collaborates with parents, teachers, administrators, community leaders and other stakeholders to promote and support student success
  • II-C-1. Has an impact on every student rather than a series of services provided only to students in need

National School Counseling Week

National School Counseling Week was February 6-10th, so to celebrate I gathered supplies from the ASCA website  to promote the incredible work that school counselors do. As the president of Chi Sigma Iota-Sigma Phi Upsilon chapter, I decided to put together #NSCW2017 kits for all the school counseling graduate students at Seattle Pacific University to help them celebrate at their practicum/internship sites. This week is about celebrating school counselors’ contribution to the educational field, as well as educate people in the community about what school counselors do…because they do so much!

 

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA Ethical Standards
  • B.2. c. Advocate for a school counseling program free of non-school-counselig assignments identified by “The ASCA National Model: A Framework for School Counseling Programs” as inappropriate to the school counselor’s role.
  • C.a. Advocating both within and outside of their schools or districts for adequate resources to implment a comprehensive school counseling program and meet their students’ needs.
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • I-B-1e. Describes the benefits of a comprehensive school counseling program for all stakeholders, including students, parents, teachers, administrators, school boards, department of education, school counselors, counselor educators, community stakeholders and business leaders.
  • II-C-3. Is an integral component of student success and the overall mission of the school and school district.

 

 

Organization Boot Camp

I was awarded a $400 grant by the Mukilteo Schools Foundation Grant for a pilot program called Organizational Boot Camp.  I developed this program using a comprehensive model. The program includes a classroom guidance lesson, 8 group counseling lessons, and peer mentoring lessons. I will be offering students materials to assist with enhancing their organization and study skills throughout the program. Voyager Middle School is set up on a teaming model, so I am piloting the program in one of the teams with 60 students. The reason for choosing this team is the teachers brought this need to our attention and the needs assessment data demonstrated a necessity.

Last week I conducted the guidance lesson in the two classes. We did a backpack race where 2 students competed to find a piece of paper with a red X on it. One of the backpacks was very well-organized with a well organized binder, and the other had papers shoved in it and a binder with papers falling out of it. This activity was a huge hit! I followed this with a discussion around binder organization.  I solicited advice from students, pointed out individual differences in organizational methods, and finished the lesson with a pair share on how students might increase their organization. Throughout the lesson I referred back to our agenda, which I wrote out as a to do list.

This week I met with students who had low scores on their pretest to screen them for the small group.  I was pleased to hear that two of the students I interviewed had already organized their binders following our lesson! Next week we will begin the small group lessons using this curriculum: https://dese.mo.gov/sites/default/files/guid-resp-serv-sm-group-unit-study-skills-org-study-skills-prep-6-8.pdf

Lesson Plan: organization-lesson-plan-copyorganization-lesson-plan

Organize Your Life PowerPoint: organization-lesson-plan

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA National Standards for Students
  • A:A1.3 Take pride in work and achievement
  • A:A1. 5 Identify attitudes and behaviors that lead to successful learning
  • A:A2.4 Apply knowledge and learning styles to positively influence school performance
  • A:B1.7 Become a self-directed and independent learner
  • C:A1.6 Learn how to set goals
• ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors for Student Success
  • M 2. Self-confidence in ability to succeed
  • B-LS 3. Use time-management, organizational and study skills
  • B-LS 4. Apply self-motivation and self-direction to learning
  • B-LS 7. Identify long- and short-term academic, career and social/emotional goals
• ASCA Ethical Standards
  • A.4. Academic, Career and Social/Emotional Plans
  • A.7. Group Work
  • A. 8. Student Peer-Support Program
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • I-A-5. Individual counseling, group counseling and classroom instruction ensuring equitable access to resources promoting academic achievement, career development and personal/social development for every student
  • III-B-3f. Uses school data to identify and assist individual students who do not perform at grade level and do not have opportunities and resources to be successful in school
  • III-B-6a. Uses appropriate academic and behavioral data to develop school counseling core curriculum, small-group and closing-the-gap action plans and determines appropriate students for the target group or interventions
  • III-B-6e. Determine the intended impact on academics, attendance and behavior
  • IV-B-1c. Demonstrates classroom management and instructional skills
  • IV-B-2g. Understands methods for helping students monitor and direct their own learning and personal/social and career development

Holiday Help

Voyager Middle School teams up with multiple community organizations to offer families gifts and food during the holiday season. The school counselors manage the process of determining what families qualify. We used data to determine which families qualified for the holiday help by using our needs assessment results and the list of students who receive free meals. The next step was calling each student down for a pre-screening to determine if their family might benefit from this program. We then gave the student a questionnaire to have their family fill out. The questionnaire asked:

• Share a bit of their story and why they could use this holiday help
• List out each family member’s name, age, needs, wants
• Traditional foods the family eats during the holidays
• Local grocery store

The students then needed to bring the questionnaire back to us, so we could forward it on to our community partners. Somewhere along the way emails weren’t received and we had 7 families who weren’t going to receive any holiday help.

I am currently the president of Chi Sigma Iota-Sigma Phi Upsilon chapter, an international honors society for counselors. As a last-minute fundraiser, I was able to raise $1,258 and sponsor 2 of the holiday help families at Voyager Middle School. The response that my fellow classmates, family and friends showed was truly amazing.

Despite the amazing experience I had doing this, I don’t condone school counselors being fully responsible for programs such as this. It takes time away from responsibilities described in the comprehensive school counseling program. However, in a school located in a low-income area with over 70% of students on free/reduced meals it was necessary for us to support our families during the holiday season. Based on the increasing need of families in the area the school counselors are already making plans on how to improve this program and there is discussion on handing it off to a more appropriate person, such as the student support advocate.

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA National Standards for Students
  • PS:C1.1 Demonstrate knowledge of personal information
  • PS:C1.6 Identify resource people in the school and community, and know how to seek their help
• ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors for Student Success
  • M 3. Sense of belonging in the school environment
• ASCA Ethical Standards
  • A.6. Appropriate Referrals and Advocacy
  • A.10. Underserved and At-Risk Populations
  • B.1. Responsibilities to Parents/Guardians
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • IV-B-3. Provides responsive services
  • IV-B-4a. Understands how to make referrals to appropriate professionals when necessary
  • IV-B-4b. Compiles referral resources to utilize with students, staff and families to effectively address issues
  • IV-B-4c. Develops a list of community agencies and service providers for student referrals

 

Lego Lunch Group

This was the best lunch group idea! It started with one student who was really struggling with making and maintaining friends. This student loves his robotics class, so after brainstorming how we could build on his strengths to help him build stronger friendship skills…lego lunch was formed!

I asked teachers for recommendations for other students who might be a good fit with my student’s gentle and calm demeanor. I also utilized the needs assessment to pick out students who could potentially benefit from this group. After forming our small group we held lego lunch every Wednesday for 8 weeks. Lunch groups are a much more causal form of group counseling, so each week we simply did a brief high/low check in, played with legos, and talked about things going in the student’s lives. Yesterday was our 2nd to last lego lunch group, but we’re allowing student’s to continue meeting in our small conference room for lego lunch on their own because of how much of a hit it was.

STANDARDS MET:

• ASCA National Standards for Students
  • PS:A2.8 Learn how to make and keep friends
• ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors for Student Success
  • M 3. Sense of belonging in the school environment
  • B-SS 2. Create positive and supportive relationships with other students
• ASCA Ethical Standards
  • A.7. Group Work
• ASCA School Counselor Competencies
  • Reviews and disaggregates student achievement, attendance and behavior data to identify and implement interventions as needed

Signs of Suicide Prevention Program

The Signs of Suicide Prevention Program (SOS) is a universal, school-based depression awareness and suicide prevention program designed for middle-school (ages 11–13) or high-school (ages 13–17) students (Signs of Suicide, 2016).

PROGRAM GOALS

1) Decrease suicide and suicide attempts by increasing student knowledge and adaptive attitudes about depression

2) Encourage personal help-seeking and/or help-seeking on behalf of a friend, 3) reduce the stigma of mental illness and acknowledge the importance of seeking help or treatment

4) Engage parents and school staff as partners in prevention through “gatekeeper” education

5) Encourage schools to develop community-based partnerships to support student mental health.

CURRICULUM

The SOS curriculum includes lessons on raising awareness of depression and suicide, helping students identify the warning signs of depression in themselves and others, identifying risk factors associated with depression and suicidal ideation, and using a brief screening for depression and/or suicidal behavior. Students are taught to seek help using the ACT (Acknowledge, Care, Tell) technique. This technique teaches students to acknowledge when there are signs of a problem in themselves or a peer, show that you care and are concerned about getting help, and tell a trusted adult. Upon completion of lesson 1, students are given response cards to indicate if they would like to speak to a trusted adult about themselves or a friend. ALL students must fill out a response card and the teacher must collect the responses then immediately put them in a manila envelope. This ensures confidentiality and establishes a safe way to ask for help without it being obvious to peers.

DELIVERY

There are various ways to implement the SOS program. At my internship site the counselors take the lead on implementation and logistics. The counselors conducted a teacher training on the SOS program and provided a schedule for conducting the lessons. Teachers are asked to provide the lessons because they are the ones who spend the most time with students and research shows students are more likely to disclose this information when their teachers show an interest in the topic. Teachers are given the opportunity to opt out due to the sensitive nature of the topic. Each grade level conducts the lessons on different days so the counselors are available to support each other. They must respond to students within 24 hours of receiving the response cards. The final part of this program is staff feedback.

MY EXPERIENCE

Teacher Training:

I was able to take on a portion of the teacher training in which I presented on:

• The role of the teachers
• The role of the counselors
• A run through of the 2nd lesson
• Myths about suicide and depression

SOS Lessons:

There were 3 teachers who opted out in the 7th grade so I stepped in to teach lessons 1 and 2 in one of the classes. The students were engaged and the discussion was lively. I had no problems with classroom management and fully enjoyed being in a classroom setting with the students.

Follow Up:

We had 40 students indicate that they wanted to talk to a counselor about herself/himself or a friend. My site supervisor and I both met with all of these students during those 2 days that we conducted the lessons.

MORE INFORMATION

About: http://www.sprc.org/resources-programs/sos-signs-suicide

Prices: http://shop.mentalhealthscreening.org/collections/youth-programs