St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic School has a certified school counselor on staff daily. The main role of the counselor is to advocate for the students and help them with any difficulties that may interfere with their academic, social, and/or emotional development. The school counselor offers the following services directly to the students as needed: individual counseling, group counseling, class counseling, support for children of divorced parents, conflict resolution meetings, and orientation for new students. Referrals for these services many come from the parents, staff, or the students themselves.
The school counselor assists faculty members as well as parents in identifying intervention strategies which are helpful in addressing pertinent issues. The counselor conducts formal classroom observations, preliminary assessments, crisis intervention, outside referrals for needed services, analyzes test results, assists during parent-teacher conferences, and meets with parents individually.
The school counselor also promotes our school-wide anti-bullying policy in many ways. Some of these include: our anti-bullying walk-a-thon, classroom presentations, working with teachers on integrating tolerance lessons in the classrooms and through Cloud 9, our character development program and through Harmony, our Social Emotional Learning and character development program.
The school counselor also provides in services for the staff as needed and helps with the HIPPA/FERPA implementation and compliance as well as overseeing our special needs programs.