5 School Counseling Time Suckers & How to Fix Them

School counseling time plays a huge role in supporting the academic, social, and emotional needs of students. In fact, that’s totally our job! However, there are so many things that get put on our plates intentionally or accidentally that we need to keep an eye on. As school counselors, we are helpers by nature, so we want to do things to pitch in. But, we need to be careful to keep an eye on the time being spent in those areas and make sure it’s not cutting into your time serving kids. Let’s take a closer look at five (good) things that take up time and five (not so) good things that take up time!

Here are five GOOD things to spend time on:

Individual counseling sessions:

One-on-one counseling sessions with students who may be struggling with academic or personal issues can take up a significant amount of a school counselor’s time. Also, we must factor in the planning time to map out individualized goals, lessons, and track progress.

Group counseling sessions:

School counselors may also run group counseling sessions for students who are dealing with similar issues, such as grief, stress, or social skills. These sessions can be time-consuming to plan and facilitate. I find this gets easier each year because I begin to see what works and what doesn’t. I like to save the group lessons that do work and work well for my style and I don’t worry about using curriculum sets that are hard to understand. This saves a ton of planning and facilitating time. Take a look at my small-group curriculum sets!

System Support tasks:

School counselors are responsible for maintaining their school counseling programs. This comes with some paperwork and data collection. If you are blessed to be a part of a team, that can drastically cut down time if you can share some of the responsibilities. I like to batch tasks so that I can get the bulk of it done in one sitting and not have to do it again for a while. For example, once or twice a month I will sit down with my planner and do all of my scheduling, newsletters, and data review.

Crisis response:

School counselors may be called upon to respond to crisis situations, such as student mental health emergencies or school safety incidents. These situations can be time-sensitive and require a significant amount of attention and resources. When true emergencies happen, we just drop everything and go! There will be no time limit for these instances and they become top priority.

Referrals:

School counselors often receive referrals from teachers, parents, or other school staff for students who may need additional support or services. Following up on these referrals and providing appropriate support can take up a significant amount of time. I like to keep a running list of students to check in with weekly or bi-weekly. I also keep a running list of high-priority referrals that need my attention as soon as possible.

School counselors have many important responsibilities. It’s crucial to prioritize time effectively to ensure we can best support the academic, social, and emotional needs of our students. However, we all know that school counselors can sometimes have extra responsibilities that can suck up our time! To manage the workload effectively, we need to prioritize tasks, delegate responsibilities where possible, and develop efficient systems for managing our time and resources.

Here are five TIME SUCKERS:

Non-counseling tasks:

School counselors should avoid tasks that do not fall within their scope of practice. Such as managing administrative duties unrelated to counseling, attending meetings that are not relevant to our work (if you can get out of teacher-directed meetings), or managing tasks that could be delegated to other school staff.

Personal issues:

Counselors should focus on providing counseling services to students and support to staff members as needed. We’re counselors because we care and we want to help others. However, there are boundary lines that sometimes get crossed. Especially if you’ve been in one school district for a long time and built personal relationships. Always be that referral point and provide the necessary referrals, but don’t take on peer conversations that lead to counseling for personal reasons during the school day.

Academic advising:

While school counselors do provide academic advising, the primary role is to address students’ social, emotional, AND academic needs. There are some academic advising responsibilities such as scheduling courses, reviewing transcripts, or monitoring grades. However, too much time spent in one area neglects the other areas. Low-priority tasks should be delegated to other school staff such as secretaries and other staff members. If you are flooded with one area, advocate for help. That way students don’t miss out on having their other needs met as well.

Discipline:

School counselors may be involved in addressing student behavior, but discipline is typically the responsibility of school administrators or other trained staff members. School counselors should avoid spending time on disciplinary matters. Instead, focus on providing counseling services to support students who may be experiencing behavioral challenges. Read about this more in my article… School Counseling Role with Student Discipline.

Excessive paperwork:

While school counselors are responsible for maintaining records related to counseling services, excessive paperwork can take away from time spent providing direct counseling services to students. Counselors should work to minimize their paperwork responsibilities and use efficient systems for documenting counseling sessions.

Overall, school counselors should focus time on tasks that align with their scope of practice. Think about what’s most beneficial to the students you serve. Tasks that can be handled by other school staff should be delegated. Try to avoid tasks that are not relevant to your specific work (I know this is easier said than done!) Also, school counselors should prioritize their time and resources effectively to best support their students.

Challenge: Take some time to look at where you spend your time. Do you spend it on non-counseling time suckers or do you spend it wisely? If you do spend it wisely and still feel overwhelmed, try delegating some of the paperwork tasks. Or, setting aside some planned time each week to tackle all the small things at once.