School for School Counselors Podcast

GRADED: When Short-Term Counseling Fails Students

• School for School Counselors • Episode 158

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We’ve all been told school counseling should be short-term and goal-focused, and most of us have tried to follow that rule: running six-week groups, setting goals, and wrapping things up quickly.

But when those same students show up in your office again weeks later- or their behavior backslides the moment your group ends- you’re left wondering:
Was it the student… or was it me?

In this episode, we’re talking about the deeper truth behind short-term counseling:

  • Why it feels like failure,
  • How it leaves counselors holding the emotional bag, and
  • What it really means to “stay in scope” when the needs run deeper than the time allows.

How does short-term counseling really measure up?

And when the grade gets revealed… will you agree?


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⭐️ Want support with real-world strategies that actually work on your campus? We’re doing that every day in the School for School Counselors Mastermind. Come join us! ⭐️

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Our goal at School for School Counselors is to help school counselors stay on fire, make huge impacts for students, and catalyze change for our roles through grassroots advocacy and collaboration. Listen to get to know more about us and our mission, feel empowered and inspired, and set yourself up for success in the wonderful world of school counseling.

Speaker 1:

We've all been taught that short-term counseling is the gold standard for school-based mental health support. It's clean, convenient and it's clearly defined in our ethical guidelines Short-term, goal-focused and school-appropriate. But what happens when it's not enough? When that six-week group doesn't change a child's life, or those eight weeks of individual counseling sessions produced nothing? And now everyone's looking at you. Maybe the student looked like they were making real progress until the session stopped, or maybe a group ended with some awesome reflection and closure, but the behaviors came back before the next bell. You start to wonder was it me? Did I mess this up? Was the group too short? Was the content too shallow, or was the problem too big? Today we're going to evaluate the real impact and the real limitations of short-term counseling in schools. Because, besides the fact that there's no real consensus on what short-term even means three, six, ten, who knows? And while we're told it's effective, no one really talks about what happens after those sessions end. So today we're going to take a hard look at what short-term counseling really is in schools. So today we're going to take a hard look at what short-term counseling really is in schools, not what it should be, but how it plays out in real-world campuses. Because, for all its practicality, this model has real gaps, and school counselors like you and I are falling right through them. Hey, skoll Counselor, welcome back In this episode of our new graded series. We're pulling back the curtain on the quick fix approach we've been trained to use and we're taking a hard look at how short-term counseling really holds up in schools today. I'll share one of my own early missteps that still sticks with me. Show you what the research actually says about short-term impact and help you understand how to stay inside your ethical boundaries without feeling like you're leaving kids behind. So if you're ready for some straight talk, my friend, some clarity on your work and a little bit of rebellion, you're gonna be in the right place. This is the School for School Counselors podcast.

Speaker 1:

I still remember an early group. I ran with a set of first graders around anger management. We met each week. We worked through the activities of this little curriculum. This was back in my TPT days and by the end their teachers told me they were seeing real improvements. Hooray, I patted myself on the back. My job was done. But the very next week, when the students expected me to pick them up and I didn't show because the group was over and they realized it was truly over. They fell apart. The behaviors returned, the same problems cropped up. The teachers were confused and I felt like I looked incompetent. These were just first graders doing their best in a system that gave them a spark of self-regulation success but their personal circumstances and academic struggles were more than enough to put that fire out very quickly. I realized something then that no textbook had ever warned me about.

Speaker 1:

Short-term counseling can work, but when we pretend that it's a cure-all, we set ourselves and our students up for disappointment. The mental health needs we see now are deeper and more complex than ever. According to a 2023 report from Mental Health America, over 60% of youth with major depression do not receive any mental health treatment In schools. Only 38% of public campuses report providing treatment for students with mental health disorders. So what happens instead? That student likely gets referred to you.

Speaker 1:

You know the school counselor who isn't supposed to do therapy, but who everyone expects to fix it. Maybe it's a fourth grader who's lost a parent and cries every time someone mentions family. Maybe it's a middle schooler who's been in and out of homelessness all year. Maybe it's a high schooler who's self in and out of homelessness all year. Maybe it's a high schooler who's self-harming but insists they're fine. And you know from training and from instinct that short-term solutions aren't always going to be enough. Here's what the research says. What the research says Some short-term models like brief CBT or solution-focused techniques can produce small, measurable gains, but those gains tend to erode pretty quickly without structured reinforcement or follow-up.

Speaker 1:

Research on time-limited school counseling has shown that student progress often regresses within several weeks if no additional supports are in place. It's like getting a car wash your ride is shiny and sparkly for a little while, but without regular upkeep it gets dirty again fast. And some concerns like trauma or attachment wounds are even contraindicated for brief work. A six-week group curriculum isn't going to be able to handle the student who is reacting out of deep-seated trauma. It's like giving them an aspirin when their leg is broken. It's not going to fix the problem.

Speaker 1:

So what do you do? Because sometimes you can't make an outside referral, either because the family can't afford it, they won't follow through, or the nearest provider is 45 minutes away with a six-month-long wait list. So you get faced with an impossible choice. Do you tell the family and your school staff I'm sorry, I've done all I can, while the child continues to throw chairs and curse out teachers? Or do you keep seeing the student even though you know you're stepping beyond your scope? Maybe you make an exception just a few more visits.

Speaker 1:

You stretch your boundaries, blur your role and hope to high heaven that it's the right thing. And let's be honest, sometimes we also do this to make ourselves feel better, to satisfy that moral urge, to save face with the teacher who's frustrated, or to feel like we didn't abandon the kid and maybe you get through the week, maybe the behavior improves. But what have you traded away in the process? Your scope, your sanity, your credibility? When we overextend it confuses administrators, families and even students about what our role on campus really is. It feels terrible to let students go before you've reached a resolution for them. You feel it in your soul and everything in us wants to stick in the fight to achieve the good outcome for the student's own good.

Speaker 1:

But sometimes that's not always the best choice. That is the discomfort of short-term counseling in schools. It's really not about ethics, it's not about how effective it is, but it's about how this expectation is deeply incomplete and there is no one telling you what to do with that. So what grade would I give short-term counseling on campus? I'm going to give short-term counseling a grade of B here's why. It's structured, it's ethical and it's research-informed. But it's often misused. It's often over-applied and oversold and in the real world it is very often not enough on its own.

Speaker 1:

From my perspective, perhaps the best path forward is structured short-term intervention plus built-in referral protocols and sustainability checks. That means setting a clear scope at the beginning of the counseling relationship what you will and will not be able to do. And that's not just talking about students and gaining assent, that's talking about perhaps parents as well. And some of you who hold to your confidentiality banner very, very tightly, are going to feel really uncomfortable with that statement. So I would encourage you, if that gives you pause, get some good quality supervision or consultation on this topic. But setting that clear scope and making sure that everyone understands the boundaries from the get-go can only help.

Speaker 1:

Secondly is creating documented referral plans for deeper support when needs exceed your model. You need to know where to go before it's time to try to figure out how to get there. So have some things in mind already. You can probably already tell by the time you start getting to visit six or seven whether or not this thing is going to resolve. And if it doesn't look like it, go ahead and start gathering those referrals and laying the tracks with parents so that they do not get blindsided. So that they do not get blindsided. And third, create some sustainability checks. Protect the gains that the student has made With follow-up. They're unlikely to backslide as far until they're able to get into some deeper supports. So check in occasionally, touch base and keep the rapport in place. That way you're honoring your ethical boundaries, you're equipping families to find real treatment and you're still able to deliver the goal-focused care that you were hired to provide.

Speaker 1:

If you need more support as you navigate this weird middle ground of short-term counseling, these are the kinds of conundrums that we're helping counselors deal with every week inside the School for School Counselors Mastermind. So if you ever felt like you were doing everything the right way and still getting nowhere, it may be time to try something different. You can find out about it at schoolforschoolcounselorscom slash mastermind. All right, I'll be back soon with another episode of this graded series on the School for School Counselors podcast, where we are going to be talking about one of the holy grails of school counseling dun, dun dun needs assessments. This one's going to be an intense episode, so keep listening. I'll be back soon and until then I hope you have the best week. Take care.

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Steph Johnson

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