May 19, 2025 • 25 mins
What you forget in May will come back to bite you in August. In this episode, we cover 5 school counseling mistakes that cause chaos when the year starts- and how to avoid them while you still can.
You’re running on fumes. May is chaos. And the last thing you want is another “end-of-year checklist.”
But here’s the truth: what you forget now will turn into a full-on mess in August.
We’re walking through 5 school counseling mistakes that seem small in May but turn into massive headaches when the new year hits. These aren’t the obvious ones, either. We’re talking about the subtle slip-ups that leave you scrambling, frustrated, or starting from scratch… again.
You’ll learn:
- What to jot down now that’ll save your sanity in the fall
- Why “data reflection” doesn’t have to mean hours of spreadsheets
- How to close out the year with intention (even if you’re over it)
- The one thing you’re probably skipping that sets the tone for August
- A smarter, simpler way to stay sharp over the summer (without burning out)
If you’re a school counselor trying to finish strong without falling apart, this episode is for you.
Mentioned in this Episode:
School for School Counselors Mastermind
List of Closure Activities for Students
*********************************
⭐️ Want support with real-world strategies that actually work on your campus? We’re doing that every day in the School for School Counselors Mastermind. Come join us! ⭐️
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Our goal at School for School Counselors is to help school counselors stay on fire, make huge impacts for students, and catalyze change for our roles through grassroots advocacy and collaboration. Listen to get to know more about us and our mission, feel empowered and inspired, and set yourself up for success in the wonderful world of school counseling.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oh gracious.
May is a weird month for schoolcounselors.
You're somehow like running asfast as you can but also
crawling at the same time towardthe finish line of the end of
the year and every day feelslike it's three weeks long.
And then you look back and itfeels like the weeks were gone
(00:21):
in the blink of an eye.
It is so strange and you'redoing probably some more
classroom coverage than normalawards ceremonies.
We have all these last minutecrises coming in, often from
kids who are just starting torealize that their safety net of
school is about to be takenaway for the summer.
And then we still have theongoing vortex of behavior
(00:44):
referrals and emotionalmeltdowns, and maybe you're
having some too.
May is rough and for some ofyou, june is rough because
you're going into June.
If you're like me and you'retrying to get through all these
things in the day, at some pointsomeone's going to ask you what
are you doing this summer?
And honestly, I got asked thatthe other day and I froze
(01:10):
because I haven't even gotten toAugust in my head yet.
I'm just still trying to getthrough the last week of school
with kiddos and my last weeks onduty on campus and I haven't
even thought about vacations ortrips or anything that I want to
do.
So if that's you, I want you toknow.
I totally get it.
(01:31):
But as we march toward the endof the school year, we need to
also remember that how we handleour last few weeks is going to
have a direct effect on howbehind we feel when we're
starting in August and onwhether or not we walk in
feeling confident and preparedor whether we walk in feeling
(01:52):
overwhelmed and kind of alreadybehind.
So in this podcast episode, Iwant to walk you through five
common end-of-the-year mistakesthat school counselors make.
And it's not because you'redisorganized or you're careless.
It's usually because of theopposite.
It's usually because you are sobusy taking care of everybody
(02:15):
else on your campus that youforget you also need to do some
things for yourself.
So we're going to change that.
We're going to talk about themistakes.
We're going to talk about whatyou can do instead, and as you
listen, you can kind of checkthe boxes and decide whether or
not you are ready to go for thenext school year.
(02:36):
You might hear some things youwant to implement and make sure
you get done, because they'renot finished yet, or you may
listen and think man, I'm a rockstar.
This is already ready to go,but either way, this episode is
going to be amazing for you.
Hey, my friend, welcome back.
I'm Steph Johnson, a licensedprofessional counselor and
(02:59):
full-time school counselor, justlike you.
If you're tired of schoolcounseling advice that sounds
like it came from Pinterest,you're in the right place.
Around here, we're keeping itreal, we're keeping it grounded
and I'm giving you tools andideas that actually work,
because you deserve more thangraphics and empty promises.
(03:22):
All right, so mistake numberone that school counselors often
make at the end of the year isnot leaving enough breadcrumbs
for the August version of you.
When we're in the thick of it,when it's down and dirty on
campus in May and June, it'seasy to think that we are going
(03:45):
to remember all the things andwe tell ourselves things like
I'll find that student whenschool starts, I'll remember to
talk to them, or that would be areally great idea for a group
in the fall, or this kid's 504accommodations were not helpful.
We need to make an adjustmentand you think that you're gonna
(04:06):
hold all this information inyour brain and that you're gonna
be able to retrieve it when yougo back in August or September.
But once you're in summer mode,hopefully you're going to
forget all about the things thatwere happening on campus.
Hopefully you're gonna betaking some amazing trips.
You're going to be resting andrejuvenating, and once those
(04:27):
margaritas kick in, your bestintentions might get forgotten.
And it's not because you don'tcare right, but when you come
back at the beginning of theschool year, you're going to
have other stuff popping up too.
You might have enrollmentissues, you might be dealing
with schedule changes, new stafftrainings and a million
(04:49):
interruptions.
Right?
Can I just ask you a question?
Do you just have a second?
Do you know anything about thiskid, those kinds of things?
And on top of all that, if youhaven't left these breadcrumbs,
you're going to spend all ofyour energy trying to remember
what it was you wanted toremember instead of moving
forward with your new concerns.
So I suggest starting abeginning of year folder.
(05:13):
It doesn't matter if it'sGoogle Drive, if it's in a
regular notebook or even if it'sjust a big sticky note.
Just make it something that youwon't lose and that you can't
misplace, and in that folder,just drop things you're going to
want to know about when schoolstarts up again.
Maybe it's students who mightneed some immediate check-ins.
(05:36):
These are the guys that youknow are going to come back to
school dysregulated or needingsupport, because you've seen it
before.
Maybe it's lists of teachers orparents who requested follow-up
or that you want to follow upwith after the summer.
Hey, how was the summer?
How were those services Ireferred you to?
Did they help?
What are you seeing now?
(05:56):
That kind of thing?
Maybe it's some group ideasthat you wanted to do in the
spring but didn't have the timeor energy to implement.
Maybe it's the names of staffmembers that you know are going
to collaborate with you likenobody's business, and you just
want to remember who yourall-stars were the previous year
.
That one sounds silly, I know,but you'd be surprised what you
(06:19):
forget in the span of just a fewmonths.
Maybe you need to keep lists offailures from this school year
or retentions or things likethat.
Have them all there, ready togo, so you're not having to
scramble and try to rememberwhere they're all located, even
if they're in your SIS, yourstudent information system.
It sure would be nice to have areport already printed or saved
(06:42):
somewhere ready to go and thennon-counseling needs that you're
going to be looking at in thefall?
Who is going to need to be inyour food program?
Who showed up without a coatall winter?
That you need to start sourcingwinter items for as soon as
school starts?
Who relied on school supplydonations?
(07:04):
These are absolutely issuesthat are going to show up again,
and so if you are already astep ahead in thinking this
direction and you simply have toopen this folder to access your
quote-unquote memory, you'regoing to look like a rock star.
Think of your beginning of yearfolder as a love letter to
(07:26):
yourself.
This is a way of saying yourwork matters.
It's important.
Let's not lose this in theshuffle, because I believe in
the impacts that you're capableof making All right.
Mistake number two is ignoringyour end-of-year campus data.
(07:47):
Now, you might have just gottena little shiver when I said
that, because you're thinkingman, I'm just trying to finish
what I've got on my plate rightnow.
I sure don't want to go lookbackwards, and I certainly don't
want to have to go access anydata to do it.
I'm sick of talking about it,I'm sick of looking at it.
(08:07):
I don't want to know any more,but your campus data is going to
be one of your best sources ofinsight, and it's something that
most school counselors, I finddon't start looking at until the
fall, and by that time it'susually too late to plan
anything big with any sort ofintention.
(08:29):
So if you can start looking atthings like which students were
repeatedly getting referrals,which grade levels had the worst
attendance, where were the mostconsistent academic struggles
on your campus Could have beenkids, could have been certain
classes, could have been certaingrade levels, or which students
(08:52):
came through your office overand over and over again, this is
the roadmap for where you'reheaded next year, because even
if a few of these kids don'tcome back to your campus, we're
still going to see referrals,attendance and academics, and
all of those concerns are notgoing to simultaneously move
(09:15):
away right.
So we need to have these at topof mind and this doesn't need to
be like a full-blown dataanalysis.
We were talking about this inour School for School Counselors
Mastermind recently, and I wastelling members that I feel like
the data conversation in schoolcounseling has been way
(09:35):
overcomplicated and as wegathered for our monthly data
discussions meeting and we weretalking about the kinds of data
that school counselors hadeither collected or had access
to and what they wanted to dowith that data.
It was kind of blowing theirminds how we could put that
information together in astreamlined way and make it so
(10:00):
easy.
So instead of it feeling likeit's going to take hours like
you often hear when people talkabout school counseling data we
could knock it out in 20 or 30minutes.
So take 30 minutes sometime atthe end of your year and look
for patterns.
Even if you only find one ortwo takeaways, that is going to
(10:21):
set you up for some phenomenalimpact for next year.
Do not wait until beginning ofyour PD to start thinking about
these things.
Look at it now, while it'sfresh, so you don't forget.
Mistake number three.
This one sounds kind of stupid,but I'm here to tell you I
(10:45):
think it happens more often thanpeople admit.
I have caught theseundercurrents for the last few
years with a lot of schoolcounselors that I work with at
the beginning of the year.
So I feel like I can say thiswith certainty and this one
feels like it's kind of minor,but it's really not.
Every single July we host anevent called Best Year Ever, and
(11:09):
I hear it from counselors whowalk in their office and
immediately feel overwhelmedbecause they're walking into
paper piles, mystery binders orlike these random notes that we
scribble to ourselves on stickynotes, and then you know we walk
away and a few weeks or a fewmonths later we have no idea
what those notes we're talkingabout and then you don't even
(11:32):
have any memory of what you weredoing the last few weeks of May
.
When you start the year likethat, it sucks the momentum
right out of you.
Your energy is depleted alreadyand it makes everything feel
harder.
Now I know this sounds dramatic,but how many times have you
walked into your office after asummer break and you've opened a
(11:55):
desk drawer or a filing cabinetdrawer or something like that,
and you come across the mysterypile Stuff that you stashed in
May or June because you werejust running so hard you didn't
want to have to deal with it.
You didn't have the mentalenergy to sort through it and to
put it where it went and youthought I'll get to it later,
(12:16):
but you never did.
You don't have to go all MarieKondo on your office, right?
This is not about transformingyour working space, but if you
can spend like 10 minutes everyday during the last week of
school.
You could toss the stuff youknow you're not going to use
anymore.
I just did that last week.
(12:37):
I went through all of my hangingfile folders and what few
resources I keep on hand.
I tossed out probably threequarters of them.
To be honest, there are only afew printed resources that I
even use in my office anymore,so I tossed those out.
I tossed out a bunch of theseworkbooks for students people
have been giving me over theyears Y'all.
(12:59):
I would rather stick a pencilin my eye than sit a kid down
with a workbook, and so I gotrid of all of them.
But I digress.
You could also use this 10minutes a day to file materials
or label the things that youwant to keep.
File materials or label thethings that you want to keep, or
leave yourself some notes.
Over-explain what you think youneed to communicate.
(13:26):
Use this for Red Ribbon Week,not just leaving an extra copy
in the file.
Or these are fall groupmaterials for attendance
concerned.
Whatever.
Over-explplain it because youmay not remember so well when
you come back.
You can even label these areextra copies.
Don't print them again, thatkind of stuff.
So you're not organizing for thesake of making it look good
(13:48):
because, let's be honest, youcould just shovel that in a
drawer and lock it and no onewould be the wiser.
Right a drawer and lock it andno one would be the wiser.
Right.
You're organizing so that youcan step back into your work
quickly and calmly and not havethe mental load of having to
shuffle and sort through it justto go.
What is that again?
Where does that go?
Okay, yeah, it goes there.
We want to eliminate all ofthose roadblocks from the get-go
(14:11):
.
All right, moving right along.
We have talked about threemistakes so far Not leaving
breadcrumbs for the start of thenew school year, ignoring your
campus data and leaving youroffice in chaos.
The fourth mistake I often seeschool counselors make is
(14:32):
missing closure opportunitieswith students as well as staff.
This one is easy to missbecause we are running like our
hair is on fire and we feel likewe can't get all the things
done right.
I often tell the teachers on mycampus the last week of school,
(14:53):
when you guys are living it up,having parties, watching movies
, doing all the fun stuff, I'min the background working harder
than I ever have trying to getthings finished up and closed
out for the end of the schoolyear, and I don't tell them that
to make them feel bad, butthere is a distinct contrast,
and if you're working like I do,which I imagine you are, if
(15:13):
you're listening to the podcast,you know what I mean.
But closure matters a lot to alot of people, and one group we
don't typically think aboutclosure for is our staff.
I'm guessing you probably haveteachers, paras, administrators
(15:33):
or office staff that had yourback this school year.
Maybe they were helping toalert you to students who needed
support.
Maybe they were defending yourtime, maybe they were defending
your role, maybe they werechecking in or maybe they were
just a great friend to you.
Acknowledging that builds trust.
(15:56):
It not only strengthens yourreputation as a great teammate,
but it builds your socialcapital.
It makes people more likely tolook forward to working with you
again next year.
So take a few minutes and writea couple thank you notes, or
send a quick email, or even juststop for a hallway chat.
(16:19):
Let people know how much youappreciate them in your efforts.
Let them know what theircontributions meant, not only to
you but to the students.
Y'all this does not have to beformal.
Just make it genuine.
That's all it needs.
And then, if you have somestudents that you've worked with
(16:40):
a little bit longer term incounseling services, you sure
don't want to ghost them whenschool's out.
Right, your students deservesome closure.
They need to know that the workthat you did together matters
and they need to recognize thatthey've made progress.
There are a lot of ways tofacilitate closure with students
(17:02):
.
I can help with a list of thoseif you're interested.
I'll drop a link into the shownotes here and you can download
the list.
Pick three to five studentsthat maybe you saw the most and
let them know that your timewith them mattered, that they
have what it takes for thesummer and that you're going to
miss them.
(17:22):
All right, so now we're down tomistake number five.
This one you might not want tohear, but I'm going to lay it
out there anyway, because youknow I'm all about the straight
talk.
Mistake number five and this isthe one I think I see most
often with school counselors isskipping meaningful summer
(17:45):
professional development becauseyou're too tired.
Now let me be clear before Ilaunch into this one.
You do not need to spend yourentire summer doing school
counseling training.
That sounds terrible, but youalso don't want to go to the
other extreme, where you don'tdo anything at all, because then
you may come back not feelingas prepared as you could have,
(18:07):
maybe a little less motivated,maybe more reactive than you
would have been had you had afew more tools in your tool belt
.
Here's what I know from my ownpersonal experience.
If I don't spend just a littlebit of time over the summer
thinking about what matters tome professionally in my school
(18:28):
counseling program, I feel likeI start off the year behind and
really at risk of just recyclingand repeating the same old
things I've always done.
I don't like that, as a matterof fact.
That's why I host my no StressSummer Book Study in my School
for School Counselors,mastermind and y'all.
I could not be more excitedabout the book that we have
(18:50):
chosen for this summer we'regoing to be studying Thrivers by
Dr Michelle Borba.
It's research based.
It's a real world guide forhelping students build the
internal strengths that predictlong-term success.
In the book, dr Borba outlinesseven essential character
strengths and how those traitshelp kids thrive instead of just
(19:15):
surviving.
And what I'm so excited aboutwith this is that it's going to
be super practical.
It's going to be veryevidence-based and it's not
going to require you to buy anyprograms or printables or
anything like that.
And then we're going to becollaborating across grade
levels all summer with this book, talking about how we weave
(19:38):
these traits into our schoolsefficiently and effectively.
Things like what does curiositylook like in a high school
counseling intervention group?
How do we encourageperseverance in third graders
without having to teach a lessonor bring in a whole curriculum?
How do we reinforce empathy onour campuses without feeling
(20:02):
like we're the empathy police?
It is going to be amazing,practical, inspiring, useful and
it's not going to eat up yourwhole summer.
We meet once a week.
We call it a no-stress bookstudy, because even if you show
up a week or two here or thereand you haven't had time to read
, that's okay.
(20:22):
We got your back, we got thingsin place to help.
You still get so much out ofthe conversation.
But nevertheless, whateveravenue you choose to pursue for
your summer school counseling PD, make sure it's meaningful.
Make sure it's not just one ofthese online summits with 47
different school counselors thatsigned up to present something
(20:44):
random out of their programs.
Dive into something that can becohesive, something that can
really help build your schoolcounseling program instead of
you just constantly trying topiece together all these little
one-off things.
Does that make sense?
Make it meaningful, really gofor depth instead of breadth of
experience, and I promise youit's going to pay off.
(21:07):
If you want to keep your schoolcounseling brain sharp, with us
, we have a seat for you at thesummer book study table.
You can find out more at thelink in the show notes.
All right, so we've talked aboutthe five most common end of
year mistakes that I see schoolcounselors making Not leaving
(21:27):
breadcrumbs for the next schoolyear, ignoring your campus data
because you're just so over it,leaving your office in chaos,
missing opportunities forclosure and skipping meaningful
summer professional development.
I told you I was going to giveyou five mistakes.
(21:47):
I'm going to add a sixth onejust as a bonus, because I'm
always a little extra right.
And the sixth mistake that Isee is failing to reflect before
you leave.
This mistake is so easy to makebecause once you finally get to
the end of the school year, allyou want to do is lock the door
(22:10):
and not look back, and you needto rest right.
But you also need closure.
And if you don't take time todo this kind of reflection, you
might end up repeating somethings that you don't actually
want to repeat next year.
So before you walk out of thedoor for summer, think about
(22:32):
these three questions First,what went better than expected?
Second, what do you want tostop doing next year?
It doesn't mean you're drawinga line in the sand, you're just
considering it.
And third, what do you want tofiercely protect moving forward?
(22:57):
In other words, what are yournon-negotiables?
This doesn't have to be like abig journaling session.
It doesn't have to be pretty.
Most of my answers to thingslike this are scratched out on
Post-it notes somewhere.
You can even write it down on anapkin or the back of the
envelope that your electric billcame in, it doesn't matter.
(23:18):
But get these thoughts out ofyour head and get them into the
real world so that you can startto process them and prepare for
an amazing new school year.
My friend, the end of the yearcan feel like absolute chaos,
but if we can try to avoid theseschool counselor end of year
(23:38):
mistakes, we will walk into nextyear with something that most
school counselors don't have andthat is a head start.
So just as a reminder I know Ijust mentioned this, but it's so
important If you want to enteryour summer with a purpose and
exit into fall having a plan,come join my no-stress summer
(24:02):
book study.
Inside the School for SchoolCounselors Mastermind.
We're reading Thrivers.
It's going to be real, doableways to support student
resilience across every singlegrade level, without any
malarkey, without anythingunrealistic.
This is going to be real world,applicable stuff and you're
(24:24):
going to be in a community ofcounselors who are serious about
getting better at what they do.
If you want to be an all-starschool counselor, if you want to
start to develop the kind ofclout and expertise on your
campus that makes people go, hey, we should ask the school
counselor about that.
They know what they're doingyou need to join us.
You can go toschoolforschoolcounselorscom
(24:46):
slash mastermind for theinformation.
I'll also have the link in theshow notes.
You can just go down there andclick it.
You don't have to end insurvival mode.
You can finish strong.
You are just a few steps awayfrom walking into the next year
more prepared than you've everbeen.
It's going to be amazing andI'm so glad that you lent me
(25:06):
your ear.
I'll be back soon with anotherepisode of the School for School
Counselors podcast.
In the meantime, I hope youhave the best week.
Take care.
Oh gracious.
May is a weird month for schoolcounselors.
You're somehow like running asfast as you can but also
crawling at the same time towardthe finish line of the end of
the year and every day feelslike it's three weeks long.
And then you look back and itfeels like the weeks were gone
(00:21):
in the blink of an eye.
It is so strange and you'redoing probably some more
classroom coverage than normalawards ceremonies.
We have all these last minutecrises coming in, often from
kids who are just starting torealize that their safety net of
school is about to be takenaway for the summer.
And then we still have theongoing vortex of behavior
(00:44):
referrals and emotionalmeltdowns, and maybe you're
having some too.
May is rough and for some ofyou, june is rough because
you're going into June.
If you're like me and you'retrying to get through all these
things in the day, at some pointsomeone's going to ask you what
are you doing this summer?
And honestly, I got asked thatthe other day and I froze
(01:10):
because I haven't even gotten toAugust in my head yet.
I'm just still trying to getthrough the last week of school
with kiddos and my last weeks onduty on campus and I haven't
even thought about vacations ortrips or anything that I want to
do.
So if that's you, I want you toknow.
I totally get it.
(01:31):
But as we march toward the endof the school year, we need to
also remember that how we handleour last few weeks is going to
have a direct effect on howbehind we feel when we're
starting in August and onwhether or not we walk in
feeling confident and preparedor whether we walk in feeling
(01:52):
overwhelmed and kind of alreadybehind.
So in this podcast episode, Iwant to walk you through five
common end-of-the-year mistakesthat school counselors make.
And it's not because you'redisorganized or you're careless.
It's usually because of theopposite.
It's usually because you are sobusy taking care of everybody
(02:15):
else on your campus that youforget you also need to do some
things for yourself.
So we're going to change that.
We're going to talk about themistakes.
We're going to talk about whatyou can do instead, and as you
listen, you can kind of checkthe boxes and decide whether or
not you are ready to go for thenext school year.
(02:36):
You might hear some things youwant to implement and make sure
you get done, because they'renot finished yet, or you may
listen and think man, I'm a rockstar.
This is already ready to go,but either way, this episode is
going to be amazing for you.
Hey, my friend, welcome back.
I'm Steph Johnson, a licensedprofessional counselor and
(02:59):
full-time school counselor, justlike you.
If you're tired of schoolcounseling advice that sounds
like it came from Pinterest,you're in the right place.
Around here, we're keeping itreal, we're keeping it grounded
and I'm giving you tools andideas that actually work,
because you deserve more thangraphics and empty promises.
(03:22):
All right, so mistake numberone that school counselors often
make at the end of the year isnot leaving enough breadcrumbs
for the August version of you.
When we're in the thick of it,when it's down and dirty on
campus in May and June, it'seasy to think that we are going
(03:45):
to remember all the things andwe tell ourselves things like
I'll find that student whenschool starts, I'll remember to
talk to them, or that would be areally great idea for a group
in the fall, or this kid's 504accommodations were not helpful.
We need to make an adjustmentand you think that you're gonna
(04:06):
hold all this information inyour brain and that you're gonna
be able to retrieve it when yougo back in August or September.
But once you're in summer mode,hopefully you're going to
forget all about the things thatwere happening on campus.
Hopefully you're gonna betaking some amazing trips.
You're going to be resting andrejuvenating, and once those
(04:27):
margaritas kick in, your bestintentions might get forgotten.
And it's not because you don'tcare right, but when you come
back at the beginning of theschool year, you're going to
have other stuff popping up too.
You might have enrollmentissues, you might be dealing
with schedule changes, new stafftrainings and a million
(04:49):
interruptions.
Right?
Can I just ask you a question?
Do you just have a second?
Do you know anything about thiskid, those kinds of things?
And on top of all that, if youhaven't left these breadcrumbs,
you're going to spend all ofyour energy trying to remember
what it was you wanted toremember instead of moving
forward with your new concerns.
So I suggest starting abeginning of year folder.
(05:13):
It doesn't matter if it'sGoogle Drive, if it's in a
regular notebook or even if it'sjust a big sticky note.
Just make it something that youwon't lose and that you can't
misplace, and in that folder,just drop things you're going to
want to know about when schoolstarts up again.
Maybe it's students who mightneed some immediate check-ins.
(05:36):
These are the guys that youknow are going to come back to
school dysregulated or needingsupport, because you've seen it
before.
Maybe it's lists of teachers orparents who requested follow-up
or that you want to follow upwith after the summer.
Hey, how was the summer?
How were those services Ireferred you to?
Did they help?
What are you seeing now?
(05:56):
That kind of thing?
Maybe it's some group ideasthat you wanted to do in the
spring but didn't have the timeor energy to implement.
Maybe it's the names of staffmembers that you know are going
to collaborate with you likenobody's business, and you just
want to remember who yourall-stars were the previous year
.
That one sounds silly, I know,but you'd be surprised what you
(06:19):
forget in the span of just a fewmonths.
Maybe you need to keep lists offailures from this school year
or retentions or things likethat.
Have them all there, ready togo, so you're not having to
scramble and try to rememberwhere they're all located, even
if they're in your SIS, yourstudent information system.
It sure would be nice to have areport already printed or saved
(06:42):
somewhere ready to go and thennon-counseling needs that you're
going to be looking at in thefall?
Who is going to need to be inyour food program?
Who showed up without a coatall winter?
That you need to start sourcingwinter items for as soon as
school starts?
Who relied on school supplydonations?
(07:04):
These are absolutely issuesthat are going to show up again,
and so if you are already astep ahead in thinking this
direction and you simply have toopen this folder to access your
quote-unquote memory, you'regoing to look like a rock star.
Think of your beginning of yearfolder as a love letter to
(07:26):
yourself.
This is a way of saying yourwork matters.
It's important.
Let's not lose this in theshuffle, because I believe in
the impacts that you're capableof making All right.
Mistake number two is ignoringyour end-of-year campus data.
(07:47):
Now, you might have just gottena little shiver when I said
that, because you're thinkingman, I'm just trying to finish
what I've got on my plate rightnow.
I sure don't want to go lookbackwards, and I certainly don't
want to have to go access anydata to do it.
I'm sick of talking about it,I'm sick of looking at it.
(08:07):
I don't want to know any more,but your campus data is going to
be one of your best sources ofinsight, and it's something that
most school counselors, I finddon't start looking at until the
fall, and by that time it'susually too late to plan
anything big with any sort ofintention.
(08:29):
So if you can start looking atthings like which students were
repeatedly getting referrals,which grade levels had the worst
attendance, where were the mostconsistent academic struggles
on your campus Could have beenkids, could have been certain
classes, could have been certaingrade levels, or which students
(08:52):
came through your office overand over and over again, this is
the roadmap for where you'reheaded next year, because even
if a few of these kids don'tcome back to your campus, we're
still going to see referrals,attendance and academics, and
all of those concerns are notgoing to simultaneously move
(09:15):
away right.
So we need to have these at topof mind and this doesn't need to
be like a full-blown dataanalysis.
We were talking about this inour School for School Counselors
Mastermind recently, and I wastelling members that I feel like
the data conversation in schoolcounseling has been way
(09:35):
overcomplicated and as wegathered for our monthly data
discussions meeting and we weretalking about the kinds of data
that school counselors hadeither collected or had access
to and what they wanted to dowith that data.
It was kind of blowing theirminds how we could put that
information together in astreamlined way and make it so
(10:00):
easy.
So instead of it feeling likeit's going to take hours like
you often hear when people talkabout school counseling data we
could knock it out in 20 or 30minutes.
So take 30 minutes sometime atthe end of your year and look
for patterns.
Even if you only find one ortwo takeaways, that is going to
(10:21):
set you up for some phenomenalimpact for next year.
Do not wait until beginning ofyour PD to start thinking about
these things.
Look at it now, while it'sfresh, so you don't forget.
Mistake number three.
This one sounds kind of stupid,but I'm here to tell you I
(10:45):
think it happens more often thanpeople admit.
I have caught theseundercurrents for the last few
years with a lot of schoolcounselors that I work with at
the beginning of the year.
So I feel like I can say thiswith certainty and this one
feels like it's kind of minor,but it's really not.
Every single July we host anevent called Best Year Ever, and
(11:09):
I hear it from counselors whowalk in their office and
immediately feel overwhelmedbecause they're walking into
paper piles, mystery binders orlike these random notes that we
scribble to ourselves on stickynotes, and then you know we walk
away and a few weeks or a fewmonths later we have no idea
what those notes we're talkingabout and then you don't even
(11:32):
have any memory of what you weredoing the last few weeks of May
.
When you start the year likethat, it sucks the momentum
right out of you.
Your energy is depleted alreadyand it makes everything feel
harder.
Now I know this sounds dramatic,but how many times have you
walked into your office after asummer break and you've opened a
(11:55):
desk drawer or a filing cabinetdrawer or something like that,
and you come across the mysterypile Stuff that you stashed in
May or June because you werejust running so hard you didn't
want to have to deal with it.
You didn't have the mentalenergy to sort through it and to
put it where it went and youthought I'll get to it later,
(12:16):
but you never did.
You don't have to go all MarieKondo on your office, right?
This is not about transformingyour working space, but if you
can spend like 10 minutes everyday during the last week of
school.
You could toss the stuff youknow you're not going to use
anymore.
I just did that last week.
(12:37):
I went through all of my hangingfile folders and what few
resources I keep on hand.
I tossed out probably threequarters of them.
To be honest, there are only afew printed resources that I
even use in my office anymore,so I tossed those out.
I tossed out a bunch of theseworkbooks for students people
have been giving me over theyears Y'all.
(12:59):
I would rather stick a pencilin my eye than sit a kid down
with a workbook, and so I gotrid of all of them.
But I digress.
You could also use this 10minutes a day to file materials
or label the things that youwant to keep.
File materials or label thethings that you want to keep, or
leave yourself some notes.
Over-explain what you think youneed to communicate.
(13:26):
Use this for Red Ribbon Week,not just leaving an extra copy
in the file.
Or these are fall groupmaterials for attendance
concerned.
Whatever.
Over-explplain it because youmay not remember so well when
you come back.
You can even label these areextra copies.
Don't print them again, thatkind of stuff.
So you're not organizing for thesake of making it look good
(13:48):
because, let's be honest, youcould just shovel that in a
drawer and lock it and no onewould be the wiser.
Right a drawer and lock it andno one would be the wiser.
Right.
You're organizing so that youcan step back into your work
quickly and calmly and not havethe mental load of having to
shuffle and sort through it justto go.
What is that again?
Where does that go?
Okay, yeah, it goes there.
We want to eliminate all ofthose roadblocks from the get-go
(14:11):
.
All right, moving right along.
We have talked about threemistakes so far Not leaving
breadcrumbs for the start of thenew school year, ignoring your
campus data and leaving youroffice in chaos.
The fourth mistake I often seeschool counselors make is
(14:32):
missing closure opportunitieswith students as well as staff.
This one is easy to missbecause we are running like our
hair is on fire and we feel likewe can't get all the things
done right.
I often tell the teachers on mycampus the last week of school,
(14:53):
when you guys are living it up,having parties, watching movies
, doing all the fun stuff, I'min the background working harder
than I ever have trying to getthings finished up and closed
out for the end of the schoolyear, and I don't tell them that
to make them feel bad, butthere is a distinct contrast,
and if you're working like I do,which I imagine you are, if
(15:13):
you're listening to the podcast,you know what I mean.
But closure matters a lot to alot of people, and one group we
don't typically think aboutclosure for is our staff.
I'm guessing you probably haveteachers, paras, administrators
(15:33):
or office staff that had yourback this school year.
Maybe they were helping toalert you to students who needed
support.
Maybe they were defending yourtime, maybe they were defending
your role, maybe they werechecking in or maybe they were
just a great friend to you.
Acknowledging that builds trust.
(15:56):
It not only strengthens yourreputation as a great teammate,
but it builds your socialcapital.
It makes people more likely tolook forward to working with you
again next year.
So take a few minutes and writea couple thank you notes, or
send a quick email, or even juststop for a hallway chat.
(16:19):
Let people know how much youappreciate them in your efforts.
Let them know what theircontributions meant, not only to
you but to the students.
Y'all this does not have to beformal.
Just make it genuine.
That's all it needs.
And then, if you have somestudents that you've worked with
(16:40):
a little bit longer term incounseling services, you sure
don't want to ghost them whenschool's out.
Right, your students deservesome closure.
They need to know that the workthat you did together matters
and they need to recognize thatthey've made progress.
There are a lot of ways tofacilitate closure with students
(17:02):
.
I can help with a list of thoseif you're interested.
I'll drop a link into the shownotes here and you can download
the list.
Pick three to five studentsthat maybe you saw the most and
let them know that your timewith them mattered, that they
have what it takes for thesummer and that you're going to
miss them.
(17:22):
All right, so now we're down tomistake number five.
This one you might not want tohear, but I'm going to lay it
out there anyway, because youknow I'm all about the straight
talk.
Mistake number five and this isthe one I think I see most
often with school counselors isskipping meaningful summer
(17:45):
professional development becauseyou're too tired.
Now let me be clear before Ilaunch into this one.
You do not need to spend yourentire summer doing school
counseling training.
That sounds terrible, but youalso don't want to go to the
other extreme, where you don'tdo anything at all, because then
you may come back not feelingas prepared as you could have,
(18:07):
maybe a little less motivated,maybe more reactive than you
would have been had you had afew more tools in your tool belt
.
Here's what I know from my ownpersonal experience.
If I don't spend just a littlebit of time over the summer
thinking about what matters tome professionally in my school
(18:28):
counseling program, I feel likeI start off the year behind and
really at risk of just recyclingand repeating the same old
things I've always done.
I don't like that, as a matterof fact.
That's why I host my no StressSummer Book Study in my School
for School Counselors,mastermind and y'all.
I could not be more excitedabout the book that we have
(18:50):
chosen for this summer we'regoing to be studying Thrivers by
Dr Michelle Borba.
It's research based.
It's a real world guide forhelping students build the
internal strengths that predictlong-term success.
In the book, dr Borba outlinesseven essential character
strengths and how those traitshelp kids thrive instead of just
(19:15):
surviving.
And what I'm so excited aboutwith this is that it's going to
be super practical.
It's going to be veryevidence-based and it's not
going to require you to buy anyprograms or printables or
anything like that.
And then we're going to becollaborating across grade
levels all summer with this book, talking about how we weave
(19:38):
these traits into our schoolsefficiently and effectively.
Things like what does curiositylook like in a high school
counseling intervention group?
How do we encourageperseverance in third graders
without having to teach a lessonor bring in a whole curriculum?
How do we reinforce empathy onour campuses without feeling
(20:02):
like we're the empathy police?
It is going to be amazing,practical, inspiring, useful and
it's not going to eat up yourwhole summer.
We meet once a week.
We call it a no-stress bookstudy, because even if you show
up a week or two here or thereand you haven't had time to read
, that's okay.
(20:22):
We got your back, we got thingsin place to help.
You still get so much out ofthe conversation.
But nevertheless, whateveravenue you choose to pursue for
your summer school counseling PD, make sure it's meaningful.
Make sure it's not just one ofthese online summits with 47
different school counselors thatsigned up to present something
(20:44):
random out of their programs.
Dive into something that can becohesive, something that can
really help build your schoolcounseling program instead of
you just constantly trying topiece together all these little
one-off things.
Does that make sense?
Make it meaningful, really gofor depth instead of breadth of
experience, and I promise youit's going to pay off.
(21:07):
If you want to keep your schoolcounseling brain sharp, with us
, we have a seat for you at thesummer book study table.
You can find out more at thelink in the show notes.
All right, so we've talked aboutthe five most common end of
year mistakes that I see schoolcounselors making Not leaving
(21:27):
breadcrumbs for the next schoolyear, ignoring your campus data
because you're just so over it,leaving your office in chaos,
missing opportunities forclosure and skipping meaningful
summer professional development.
I told you I was going to giveyou five mistakes.
(21:47):
I'm going to add a sixth onejust as a bonus, because I'm
always a little extra right.
And the sixth mistake that Isee is failing to reflect before
you leave.
This mistake is so easy to makebecause once you finally get to
the end of the school year, allyou want to do is lock the door
(22:10):
and not look back, and you needto rest right.
But you also need closure.
And if you don't take time todo this kind of reflection, you
might end up repeating somethings that you don't actually
want to repeat next year.
So before you walk out of thedoor for summer, think about
(22:32):
these three questions First,what went better than expected?
Second, what do you want tostop doing next year?
It doesn't mean you're drawinga line in the sand, you're just
considering it.
And third, what do you want tofiercely protect moving forward?
(22:57):
In other words, what are yournon-negotiables?
This doesn't have to be like abig journaling session.
It doesn't have to be pretty.
Most of my answers to thingslike this are scratched out on
Post-it notes somewhere.
You can even write it down on anapkin or the back of the
envelope that your electric billcame in, it doesn't matter.
(23:18):
But get these thoughts out ofyour head and get them into the
real world so that you can startto process them and prepare for
an amazing new school year.
My friend, the end of the yearcan feel like absolute chaos,
but if we can try to avoid theseschool counselor end of year
(23:38):
mistakes, we will walk into nextyear with something that most
school counselors don't have andthat is a head start.
So just as a reminder I know Ijust mentioned this, but it's so
important If you want to enteryour summer with a purpose and
exit into fall having a plan,come join my no-stress summer
(24:02):
book study.
Inside the School for SchoolCounselors Mastermind.
We're reading Thrivers.
It's going to be real, doableways to support student
resilience across every singlegrade level, without any
malarkey, without anythingunrealistic.
This is going to be real world,applicable stuff and you're
(24:24):
going to be in a community ofcounselors who are serious about
getting better at what they do.
If you want to be an all-starschool counselor, if you want to
start to develop the kind ofclout and expertise on your
campus that makes people go, hey, we should ask the school
counselor about that.
They know what they're doingyou need to join us.
You can go toschoolforschoolcounselorscom
(24:46):
slash mastermind for theinformation.
I'll also have the link in theshow notes.
You can just go down there andclick it.
You don't have to end insurvival mode.
You can finish strong.
You are just a few steps awayfrom walking into the next year
more prepared than you've everbeen.
It's going to be amazing andI'm so glad that you lent me
(25:06):
your ear.
I'll be back soon with anotherepisode of the School for School
Counselors podcast.
In the meantime, I hope youhave the best week.
Take care.
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