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College counsellor David Spencer offers us a glimpse into his daily routine working at an international school in Hungary
It's a few minutes after 8:00, classes begin in 30 minutes and I have just arrived by bicycle to work. The calmest part of the day is over; the next ten hours will not be so peaceful. In the locker room a student greets me and we discuss his cross-country running training plan. Soon a colleague arrives, also by bike, and we are discussing how the administration is jumping too far ahead in curriculum planning, or how to deal with a difficult colleague. Then it is up to the high school wing of the school and the real day begins.
Working as a counsellor in a school is a little like being schizophrenic, in that you hear 100 voices in the day. The difference is that they are mostly not in your head but with nearly everyone you meet. It is the student whose schedule is not quite right, the colleague who wants to discuss the maths placement of an 11th grader. It is the parent who writes a three-page email about why his son should be in art and not in drama. It is the graduate who has not found her place at her present university and really needs to transfer but you, the counsellor, has to help.
Early in my career I worked with an elementary principal who explained: “At the beginning of being a principal I couldn’t get my job done for all the interruptions. Soon I understood that all the interruptions were my job”. And so, it feels so often that way as a 9-12 counsellor in an international school. We begin the day with a list of things we really need to accomplish; we write lists, we post daily reminders and agendas and we enter detail into on-line calendars. We are organised and we are ready. And then, as soon as we hit the ground, the whole thing begins to unravel and soon the daily agenda, the list of ‘things to do’, is lost under twenty other papers and we have completely forgotten what we had hoped we would get done for the day.
I started in education in 1983 teaching two classes of French and over the last 27 years the progression was to Dean of Admissions, Elementary Counselor, High School Counselor and then HS Counselor and University Adviser in an international school. And over those nearly 30 years the trend has kept pace with technology. The more technological our work places have become, the more we have to keep track of and, consequently, the crazier many of us feel. As much of a luddite (anti-technologist) as I may be, I do spend more than 50% of the day dealing with Moodle, Naviance, Common App, Power School, ECIS list serve, UCAS, OAC, Entourage and the myriad other sites and software begging for our attention.
So, why do we feel so crazy? Surely, I am not alone in this. At lunch today a colleague explained he was going to write a list of all the different sites he needed to check at the start of the day to ‘be well informed’ as to what was going on at school. This is not checking his home email or the BBC about world events; this is just to find out how to do his job.
And counsellors are right in the middle of this. We have become brokers: for information, for university admissions, for testing, for any organisation that has an educational product to sell. And we are advocates for students. And in the middle of all of that chaos is exactly where the students are. I find that the only time of the day that makes any sense at all is when I am one on one with a student discussing some issue: whether it be where to apply to university, or what IB class is the best choice, or why they feel so lonely and alienated. Students bring back the sanity to a profession that has become increasingly driven by technology and its various abilities to access more information.
The problem seems to come from both the increase in time we all need to spend sifting through various sites and software to find what we need, but also the learning curve it takes to know how to use Power School, Moodle, Naviance, Entourage, E-Docs, Commonapp, UCAS etc. Once we know at a minimal level how to use the software, we are headed for bigger problems, as there is simply so much information available. All of that is coupled with no decrease in demand from the human element: the client, students, parents, faculty, administration, boards and the community. As many of us have been trained in inter-personal counselling, we have the skills and background to work with individuals and groups. And, there is the expectation that we are ready, willing and able to meet with anyone in crisis or at the very least anyone who needs some extra attention.
And so we do both, or all of the above. And our ‘to do lists’ get done and lost and re-started. We work with our students and our colleagues and try valiantly to stay focused on one thing at a time when our minds are often three steps ahead to what else needs to be done, the letters that beg to be written, the phone call that must be made. And we wonder why at the end of the day we are so exhausted. What is it about what we do that demands so much of our energy? It should be so easy; sit and talk to one person at a time. And it is only when we see one another, fellow counsellors, and there is the hallow-eyed look of fatigue and confusion when we recognise ourselves.
And it is then that the words of a veteran administrator explained to a young, green and enthusiastic counsellor come back to me: “And then I realised, that all those interruptions were my job.” And so we do what we can each day, every day. And by the time graduation rolls around we are a little worn thin, but we end the school year knowing we have done what we can, for as many as we can. And, most of the time that is enough.
Written by David Spencer
Counselor
The American International School of Budapest (Hungary)
