2018 Annual Conference

Myesha Davis, Professional School Counselor, Lovinggood Middle School, Cobb County School District
Dawn Mann, Program Manager for Career Guidance and Counseling, Georgia Department of Education

Middle
Secondary

Chon Hester

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor
Post-secondary/Admissions

Are you awake? Are you fully consciousness regarding diversity? This session will provide interactive strategies, skills building, and dynamic activities to increase attendees diversity consciousness. Attendees will enhance their knowledge of how to examine and completely understand the relationship between success and diversity consciousness. This session will enhance the attendees knowledge of building relationships and understanding, respecting, and valuing diversity.

This session will provide dynamic interactive strategies and activities to promote diversity consciousness and success with students or conduct effective professional development for staff.

Tools for working smarter, not harder
ASCA Model
Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling

Randy Blackmon

Secondary

 Online dual enrollment offers opportunity to for students who cannot get to a campus for face-to-face courses. University System of Georgia eCore provides core college courses available through 21 public colleges and universities in Georgia. Last year over 2,500 eCore courses were taken for dual credit with a historical ABC rate of 91% or 9 out of 10 students earning college credits. Tuition is funded by Georgia Dual Enrollment program.

Information:
University System of Georgia eCore program description, overall enrollments and success rates
Advantage of online option for students, particularly those from rural areas of the state.
Review of research concerning rural students and the effects of county population on college attainment. Discussion of results indicating that rural students, taking eCore for dual credit, had higher success rates than students from more populated counties.
eCore dual student county of origin, highlighted over the past three years, showing coverage across the state.
Learning Outcomes:
Increase appreciation for rural student challenges
Understand dual enrollment and its effects
Realize the potential of online dual enrollment and add viable option for student college preparation
Audience Participation: Open for questions and comments during and after the presentation
Handouts: Brochures for eCore dual enrollment

Rural Counselors
College Readiness

Tim Schwarz

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor

An experienced special education attorney provides an overview of special education law, including the new Supreme Court decision in Endrew F. Using example conversations, this presentation will break down how federal law applies in common situations, including evaluation, plan drafting, school discipline, and least restrictive environment. In short, this presentation will provide you a checklist on what it takes for special education services to be procedurally and substantively compliant with the law.

Attendees to the presentation will learn:
A) the process for evaluating a child and creating a special education plan;

B) how an IEP is evaluated to determine if it provides a free, appropriate, public education;

C) how to understand and apply procedural rights in special education, such as:

1) Least Restrictive Environment
2) Initial Evaluations, Re-evaluations, and Independent Evaluations at public expense
3) Transition Planning
4) Manifestation and School Discipline;

D) to identify the most important features of a good goal - measurability and individualization

Academics
Personal/Social

L. Nicole Ayers, MA, APC, NCC
Co-presenter: Karen D. Rowland, Ph.D., LPC, NCC

Elementary
Middle

The emotional abuse and neglect of children has profound impacts on school success and wellbeing across the lifespan. This session will offer suggestions for advocating for voiceless children in your school who may be impacted by emotional abuse. School counselors are poised to assist in ensuring positive outcomes for children who are abused. Participants will gain a holistic knowledge of the academic implications of emotional abuse, warning signs, and tools to advocate for students.

The emotional abuse and neglect of children has profound impacts on mental health and school performance across the lifespan. This session will offer suggestions for advocating for voiceless children in your school who may be impacted by emotional abuse and neglect. This presentation will provide an overview of the academic implications, lifelong impacts, and societal costs of emotional abuse on developing students. Participants will gain a holistic knowledge of the mental health and academic performance impacts of emotional abuse, the warning signs and symptoms of emotional abuse, and how abuse impacts the brain and other functioning. Participants will gain tools and strategies to advocate for voiceless students and work with families affected by emotional abuse in a school setting. A developmental trauma approach will be used to discuss the costs of emotional abuse to children at the student level, school level, and societal level. Participants will leave empowered and equipped to advocate for the needs of students impacted by emotional abuse. Recommendations and information about current initiatives, funding resources, and involvement will also be discussed.

Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling

Lynne Watts

Elementary
Middle
Secondary

Learn about personality style and communication that empowers counselors, staff and parents to speak a common language encouraging leadership traits, working in their strengths and growth mindset. DISCover your own personality style and how to create a winning environment at your school. Recognize the secret fuel and communication tips for personality. This session is highly interactive and fun! Includes a template for re-delivering a similar program at your school.

Handling Crucial Conversations through Effective Communication

Learning Objectives:

1. Participants will identify their own personality style and learn to recognize the personality styles of others
2. Participants will learn to recognize the secret fuel and environmental needs for each personality style.
3. Participants will learn communication tips to create positive crucial conversations with parents and staff.

Discuss World Class Service and Growth Mindset (10 minutes)

• Quality
• Speed of delivery
• Show you care

Introduce DISC personality assessments and basic concepts (5 minutes)

• Four basic styles
• No one personality is better than another
• Everyone is a blend

Divide the Room: (Interactive-20 minutes)

• Introvert vs Extrovert
• Task vs. People Focus
• Strengths vs. Blind Spots
• We’re all a team

  Crucial conversations and Personality Style (15 minutes)

• Secret fuel of each personality style
• Environmental needs of each personality style
• Strengths and blind spots of each personality style
• Communication tips 

Pair and Share (Interactive-10 minutes)

• Work with a partner and identify most difficult personality
• Identify ways to better communicate with each personality style           

Additional Communication Tips (10minutes)

• Set an Intention
• Start with Heart
• Develop Presence
• Things to Avoid

Handouts:

• Crucial Conversation Prep Sheet
• Cultivate Effective Crucial conversations with DISC
• Cultivate a Growth Mindset for Behavior Change
• Tips for Crucial Conversations with DISC Personality Types
• What is Your Personality Type?
• Growth Mindset vs. Fixed Mindset Comparison

Total minutes:  75 minutes

 

Tools for working smarter, not harder
Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling

Christi A. Runyan, Haralson County High School, College and Career Academy CEO/Asst. Principal
Christy McBride, Bremen High School, CTAE Director and WBL Coordinator
D'Lanna Mason, YouScience, Client Services Manager

Secondary
Counselor Educator, Supervisor
Post-secondary/Admissions

Learn how high schools in the West Georgia Technical College service area used seniors' YouScience results to partner with local employers, West Georgia Tech, and families to encourage students to take important steps toward securing a plan for post-graduation. At the Future Fair held in June 2018, students had the opportunity to interface with companies, as well as hear about the training and educational needs that can be addressed by West Georgia Tech.

Content: Discussion of how schools partnered with YouScience, local employers and West GA Tech to introduce graduating students to career and education opportunities in their local community. 

Learning Objectives:

• Learn best practices for partnering with your local technical college to implement a Future Fair using YouScience results
• Learn how to use YouScience Analytic tools to identify strong fit careers for students

Audience Participation:

• Opportunity for audience to ask questions as well as share their own experiences using YouScience results to assist students with post-secondary transitions.

Handouts/Resources:

• Will share samples of communications to parents and students regarding the Future Fair
• Will demo YouScience results

Career Development
College Readiness

Lauren Hodges and Dr. Dawn Hadley

Counselor Educator, Supervisor

Counselors want to learn the impact of Mental Health Curriculums in the school setting on mental health knowledge and attitudes towards mental health issues. Academic and social pressures have caused a rise in mental health issues and highlight the need to teach mental health awareness at the high school level introducing techniques to facilitate the development of social-emotional wellness, such as stress management and resilience. 

Adolescence is a time where students are making changes to their identities and personalities that may lead to physiological changes related to stress, anxiety, and depression (Emamjomeh & Bahrami, 2015). The latter impacts the student’s education because these physiological changes can lead to damaging consequences in socialization, communication, and physical health (Emamjomeh & Bahrami, 2015). This is further backed by information cited by Butzer et al. (2016) that indicates adolescents lead psychiatric issues found in the USA by 80%. It is not surprising that many countries have a growing interest in establishing programs that concentrate on mental wellness at the school level. These programs help combat mental health and behavioral problems. This presentation will concentrate on how the school counselor can facilitate reducing stigma and building mental health knowledge through a mental health curriculum.  The school counselors follow Kutcher and Wei’s (2017) high school mental health curriculum guide for all classroom guidance. After participating in the curriculum, students will become more aware of mental health, mental health concerns, and strategies to combat mental distress (Kutcher & Wei, 2017). Audience members will complete the same Pre test as students in the curriculum so that they can become aware of their own knowledge-base and mental health attitudes. Also, audience members will practice mindfulness, stress management techniques, and practice resiliency thinking. At the end, audience members will receive a packet of different relaxation tips and strategies to share with their students. 

Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling
New Research
Social Emotional Learning

Lacey Ricks
Malti Tuttle
Christy Land
Julia Chibbaro

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor

The process of child abuse reporting can be scary, confusing, and intimidating for novice school counselors; especially since reporting procedure vary by school district and the amount of training provided can be limited. This research study looks at novice school counselors’ experiences with child abuse reporting in the southeastern United States and provides recommendations for existing school counselors and policy changes.

This presentation will review trends and literature on child abuse reporting within the United States. Next, results from a study exploring novice school counselors’’ experiences with child abuse reporting will be reviewed. Quantitative results from the study show difference in child reporting trends based on the school counselors’ self-efficacy level, academic setting, and district income level. Additionally, qualitative analysis will provide insight from novice school counselors on common challenges they encountered when addressing child abuse reporting. Policy change recommendations and recommendations for school counselors will be provided based on the finding of this research study. The objectives of the program include, 1) to educate attendees on national trends in child abuse reporting, 2) to provide a review of our research studies findings; highlighting novices school counselors commonly faced challenges, and 3) to advocate for changes in child abuse reporting and training for school counselors. Audiences will be able to engage in the presentation through interactive discussion amongst the presenters and the attendees. Attendees will engage in small group and large group discussion within the presentation. Handouts will be provided to the attendees providing an overview of the research studies finding and a review of child abuse trends within the United States.

Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling
New Research
Rural Counselors

Lee E. Grimes and Sasha Quarles

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor

School counselors are charged ethically with monitoring their level of stress to remain competent in the face of burnout. School counselors also are leaders in their schools and can be key players in building their teaching colleagues’ awareness of stress and potential burnout. Attendees to this session will learn about teacher burnout and ways that school counselors can support teachers towards healthy balance. All attendees will receive the presentation used for presentation at their schools

Description of the content:  This session is designed to inform attendees about stress and burnout in teachers and suggest ways in which teachers can apply self-care strategies outlined by their school counselors. The presentation also suggests ways that school counselors can lead interventions in their schools to fight the effects of stress and burnout among teachers. Using Prezi, presenters will define and explain pertinent information about the effects of stress and burnout particularly as it applies to educational settings. Participants will be asked to identify and share with the group stressors they encounter among their teaching colleagues. Presenters will detail a variety of interventions targeting the stressors inherent in education. Attendees will be given the entire presentation to use at their school for a workshop or faculty meeting on the topic of planting the seeds of healthy balance and pulling the weeds of stress in the lives of teachers.

 

Learning objectives/outcomes:

1. Participants will be able to define stress and burnout.
2. Participants will be able to identify signs of burnout.
3. Participants will be able to recognize the variety of stressors unique to educational settings.
4. Participants will be able to offer strategies and techniques to teachers to assist with maintaining healthy balance to avoid burnout.
5. Participants will be able to conduct a workshop or faculty meeting at their home school using the presentation from this session.

 

Opportunities for audience participation:

1. Participants will be asked to share personal knowledge of stress, burnout, and self-care.
2. Participants will be asked to discuss in pairs their beliefs about school counselor leadership on school climate and teacher stress.
3. Participants will discuss in small groups the stressors they identify among their teachers
4. Participants will be asked to brainstorm as a group ways to manage stress and avoid burnout.

Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling
CCRPI

Angela Cleveland, M.S.Ed., M.Ed, MA
Catherine Roberts, EdD, NCC, LPC
Christy Conley
Sean Myers

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor
Post-secondary/Admissions

Georgia has nearly 21,182 open computing jobs (4.2x the state average demand rate); more than 70% of STEM careers require computer science. The arts, media and creative services–and even many middle-skills jobs–now run on computer science! The Information Age is driving rapid changes that make computer science literacy essential for every student. You are uniquely positioned to build awareness of pathways where computer science is the key to unlocking a world of opportunities.

Georgia has nearly 21,182 open computing jobs (4.2x the state average demand rate) and more than 70% of STEM careers require computer science. The arts, media and creative services–and even many middle-skills jobs–now run on computer science! The Information Age is driving rapid changes that make computer science literacy essential for every student. You are uniquely positioned to build awareness of pathways where computer science is the key to unlocking a world of opportunities.  
Gain confidence in your ability to support viable pathways that complement Georgia's goals of building our diverse Computer Science-ready workforce.

Program Provider NCWIT Counselors for Computing (C4C) provides professional school counselors with information and resources they can use to support ALL students as they explore computer science education and careers.

Career Development

Moya A. Pope, M.Ed, NCC
Monica Y. Pace, Ed.S
Shanna Williams

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor

The International Institute for Restorative Practices has defined Restorative Practice as "an emerging social science that studies how to strengthen relationships between individuals as well as social connections within communities".  As counselors, we already know the importance of fostering positive, healthy school climates and helping students learn from their mistakes.  This session will give counselors tools to assist their teachers and parents learn more about Restorative Practice and use it in their classrooms and homes. 

Learning objectives/outcomes - Participants will learn more about Restorative Practice - background of RP, different types of Restorative Practice, differences between RP and traditional discipline programs and a circle demonstration with audience members. 

Tools for working smarter, not harder
Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling
Rural Counselors
Academic Achievement
Social Emotional Learning

Alexandra Huguelet, Cobb County Public Schools
Leigh Gobbel, Pathways Transition Programs

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent

Our students have increasing mental health needs and as school counselors, we cannot do it all on our own.  The need for collaboration is immense.  Come learn how one school counselor joined forces with an outside mental health provider to meet student mental health needs during the school day.  The school counselor and outside therapist will present how they built a one-on-one counseling program to increase students served from 2 to 125 – a 6,150% increase – in just two years. 

• Participants will learn one school’s process for initiating an outside counseling program within the school building
• Participants will learn how to best utilize outside mental health providers in their building
• Participants will understand the need for outside mental health provider collaboration to meet student mental health needs

• Participants will have an opportunity to ask questions from a school counselor and outside mental health provider about the process

Personal/Social

Dr. Annette H. Patmon

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Counselor Educator, Supervisor

Professional School Counselors work collaboratively with many stakeholders to provide a Multitiered System of Supports (MTSS) for at-risk students. Response to Intervention (RTI) is a tiered system of support that identifies and assists students at-risk for school failure. This session will explore the role of the professional school counselor as an active participant of the RTI process.

This presentation will provide professional school counselors an overview of the the Response to Intervention (RTI) process and how it is used to identify and assist student at-risk for school failure. The components of the RTI process and comprehension school counseling program will be compared to show simularities within the programs.

The learning objectives/outcomes of this session will be that at the end of this session participants will be able to identfy each of the three tiers of RTI process, identify simularities of the RTI process and  the comprehensive counseling program, as well as the school counseling role associated with each tier of the RTI process.

Audience participation will be encouraged through out the session by using small prizes as rewards for correct responses. Also a 10 minute segement will be alloted at the end of the session for question and answers.

Handouts will not be provided for this presentation. The powerpoint presention will available to particpants and will be emailed upon particpants request. A sheet will be provide to collect email addresses.

Issues in Counseling

Elizabeth R Butler, School Counselor
Melissa Lester Olson, LCSW

Elementary
Middle
Secondary
Independent
Counselor Educator, Supervisor

EFT Tapping is a simple, self-administered method of emotional regulation. Tapping is taught at all levels, from simple playful versions for young children, to more sophisticated versions for adults. Research supports Tapping's effectiveness for anxiety, phobia, trauma, physical discomfort and more. Use Tapping to help your students self-soothe, to help yourself with self-care, and to share with anyone who needs help calming, containing or regulating their emotions. You will leave this session with the skills to use Tapping right away!

The Science of EFT Tapping (10 Minutes)

• A Brief Review of 5 Compelling Randomized Controlled Studies
• Reference for all EFT Tapping Research - AAMETInternational.org

Common Mechanisms and Dynamics of Tapping (10 minutes)

• The Student / Client Experience of Tapping
• Demonstration of EFT Tapping (Melissa Lester Olson)

Words of Caution (10 minutes)

• To Do versus Not to Do
• When to Use Tapping versus When to Not Use Tapping
• Tapping versus Touch & Breathe

Common School Counselor - Student Scenarios Role-Played

• Test Anxiety: Role-played with entire group/audience (10 minutes)
• Emotional Dysregulation: Role-played with Melissa Lester Olson & Elizabeth Butler (10 minutes)
• Somatic Symptoms: Role-played with volunteer from group (10 minutes)
• Trauma: Role-played with Melissa Lester Olson & Elizabeth Butler (10 minutes)

Question & Answer (10 minutes)

Distribution to Attendees:

• Visual aids for Tapping points (postcard, door hanger)
• PDG visual aid for students
• List of resources (research, videos, training opportunties)

Tools for working smarter, not harder
Personal/Social
Issues in Counseling
New Research
Social Emotional Learning