Counseling change leaves students frustrated

 

With the new school year came many changes to the CVHS administrative staff. The 2014-15 school year has a new interim principal, three new assistant principals, and expects two new counselors.

During the past few months, two counselor positions have been opened. Lisa Wasserman resigned mid-October and Ruben Mata was promoted to assistant principal when Blaine Torpey was made the new interim principal.

Both Mata and Wasserman were counselors for House Four students at the very end of the alphabet which left those students without a designated counselor.

“It’s definitely frustrating to be applying for college without the help of a counselor, but I know that the administration is doing their best to remedy this situation,” said senior Jeffrey Van.

Counselors have previously updated students with deadlines and information on application criteria, but now with two open counseling positions, students have to be spread out among the remaining counselors.

When students with last names at the end of the alphabet enter their house office to speak to a counselor, the house secretaries send them to various counselors that are available at the time, but some students may have to leave a note for the counselor and wait to be called in another day.

Head Counselor Ivery Mcknight claimed the understaffing “has reduced the amount of time that we would typically have to address student, parent, and school concerns within our individual caseloads.”

The lack of consistency in counselors has caused some students to approach their trusted teachers for advice. Teachers, however, do not believe that is the best thing for students to do.

“It feels like understaffing this year has caused a weird void in communication and knowledge where students keep coming to me with questions that I don’t feel prepared to answer but I keep filling in those questions because they can’t get those answers elsewhere,” claimed history teacher Jason Marlis.

Vacancies for counselors is not a common situation, but counselors and officer staff have been putting in their best efforts to accommodate all of the students. Although Mata is no longer a counselor, he is also doing everything he can to alleviate the situation by continuing to give advice and support to students when he has extra time.

Luckily for everyone, new counselors have been hired during the first week of November, and after a few weeks of training, they should be able to officially start working after Thanksgiving break.