This week, we’re excited to celebrate National School Counseling Week to help bring awareness to the important role that our K-12 school counselors have as they dedicate their professional lives to care for and support our students to help them achieve school success and plan for their futures. From providing safe and supportive areas for students to receive mental health or social help, to helping students remove barriers to academic success, to providing classroom lessons, to helping kids figure out “what they want to be when they grow up,” school counselors are celebrated not only this week–but every day–for the unique work they do to support all aspects of a student’s journey through school as they help each reach their potential to become his or her best. Today, we’re proud to highlight another new counselor, Ms. Paola Cordova, who started working at Owatin Creek just this past year:
Q: How long have you been a school counselor? How long have you worked at Exeter?
A: This my first year at Exeter, but my second year as a school counselor.
Q: What’s your favorite part of your job?
A: The favorite part of my job is talking and listening to my students. All of my students I met are sweet and resilient human beings. They teach me something new every day. I also enjoy doing guidance lessons and groups!
Q: What's the most challenging part of your job?
A: There is not enough time of day to do everything that needs to be done.
Q: If you were talking to someone who knew nothing about your work, how would you complete this sentence? “People are surprised to learn that..."
A: ...I teach my students about their feelings and how to communicate with one another properly.
Q: The theme for this year’s School Counseling Week is “Better Together.” What does that mean to you?
A: "Better Together" means to me as a community (e.g., parents/guardians, students, teachers, principal and anyone who interacts with the students) can help our students, and we cannot do it alone. We need to work as a team to help our students.
Q: When you were in elementary school, what did you want to be when you grew up?
A: In elementary school, I wanted to be a teacher and realtor! At a young age, I knew I loved working with people!