What's the difference? A Guidance Counselor is a term from the dark ages of school counseling. A Guidance Counselor is a person who had little training in the role of a counselor. Their job duties included "guiding" students in their college applications and high school course selection. A lot has changed in the field of counseling and the modern School Counselor has a Master's Degree specific to School Counseling. School counselors must be able to handle a wide variety of counseling issues, from suicide and ideation, grief, LGBT, cutting, absenteeism, social skills, relational aggression, technology, academic, career, giftedness, special education, group dynamics, and family relationships. School Counselors also develop a comprehensive school counseling program that focuses on 3 domains set forth by the American School Counselor Association. Those skill sets include Personal/Academic Development, Career and Decision-Making Skills, and Interpersonal Skills. Professional School Counselors develop lesson plans aligned to the common core and present on a wide range of topics. At the high school level, college planning and course selection, are a major focus of the job, but fall within these categories. At the middle and elementary levels, the focus shifts slightly. Issues regarding bullying, interpersonal skills, and academic success are the predominate areas of support, coupled with promoting a culture where all students are career and college ready.

Lunch Bunch is continuing to work on friendship lessons, learning bullying statistics, and creating our own Mean Stinks video. Recently kids finished an affirmation book, where each LBer wrote something nice about each of their peers, which was then compiled into a book for each student.