What is a Masters’s in School Counseling?

What is a Masters’s in School Counseling?

 

Hi Smit,

School counselors work in schools with a wide variety of students. They focus on preparing students for further education or the workforce, guiding them on career exploration, addressing emotional issues, defusing conflicts, and similar tasks. One training option to become a school counselor is to complete a master's in school counseling. This is usually a 2 year program with some practicum hours in the program and several hundred hours of experience afterwards to get your license as a school counselor.

School counseling should be separated from the work of School Psychologists, who usually work more intensively with students who have specific barriers to education and success, and who require a different education to be prepared for their specialist role.

What makes you ask?

 

As Dustin discussed previously, School Counselors handle various student counseling issues (academic, emotional, behavioral, conflicts, home issues that impact school performance, etc.).

School Psychologists handle the evaluation of student learning disabilities for special education services qualification. Although the school psychologist curriculum requires a majority of the courses that the School Counselors require for their degree program, school psychologists are usually only brought into counseling issues on an emergency basis (because the special education evaluations workload is so labor intense).

(I interned as a School Psychologist for a year before diverting to another quasi-allied career, so I can usually field questions in this area.)

 

There is a HUGE shortage of School Psychologists right now. I am not sure about counselors.