This School Counselor Says Her Job Is Heavy, But It’s Also ‘Soul Building’

In a new series, “Role Call,” EdSurge is elevating the experiences of the myriad school staff members who help shape the day for kids. This month, we’re featuring school counselor Leighanne Mainguy, who shares how she came into this work, what people get wrong about it, and what she wishes she could change.

The following interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

EdSurge: How did you get here? What brought you to this role?

Leighanne Mainguy: So I didn’t start counseling until I was 38. I’ve always been a helper by nature. When I was a kid, I found a lot of joy in that. When I went to college, right out of high school, I got my degree in psychology and knew I wanted to do something in that realm, but circumstances didn’t allow for that for quite some time.

For years, I was helping my husband through college, and we were having kids. We were living in Michigan, and I had a good job working in corporate America. Then we moved to Nevada, and with my husband’s support, I started a master’s program. In most states, you have to have your master’s degree to work as a school counselor.

I could have been a mental health professional as well — I could have gone into something like that. But I’ll be honest with you, I love the school environment. I love working with kids. Plus, it’s given me an opportunity to spend a lot of time with my husband and four children because they were in the school district (my husband is a teacher).

It’s something that I think I was meant to do, but how I got here was just a long, long process.

When people outside of school ask you what you do — say, at a social event — how do you describe your work?

So in my profession, especially for people my age and older, the term used to be “guidance counselor.” We prefer to be called school counselors now, because previously a “counselor” would be considered somebody who supported you in finalizing your credits, who you might’ve only seen in high school and helped you maybe decide on which direction you were going to go after high school.

Now, many school counselors do tier one counseling, which is working with all students; tier two counseling, which might look like small group support; and then we might do tier three, which is individual counseling for short periods of time. I don’t recall that ever being the case when I was a kid. I think I saw my guidance counselor once or twice, maybe, my senior year. Now we’re in elementary schools, we’re in middle schools, we’re in high schools. So it’s just a more well-rounded job.

Most of the time, I get a pretty good reaction to telling someone I’m a school counselor. They’re like, ‘Cool, that’s awesome. You’re an educator.’ But if somebody allowed me to get that deep into it, that’s what I’d say.

What does a hard day look like in your role?

Hard days can be super emotional. I think most counselors are pretty good at compartmentalizing the bigger issues so we don’t take it home at night, but we get to deal with some of the hardest things that a kid, or even a staff member, will see.

I’ve had kids come in the day after one of their parents died. I’ve had to talk to kids about some pretty horrific things that have happened in their homes. On top of that, days when we have to implement suicide protocols (after students have expressed thoughts of self-harm) are probably the most emotionally draining. We take that very seriously.

I mean, some days are kind of crazy just because you have a lot of busyness. I never know what my day is going to look like. I could come in one morning and have a plan to do three lessons and talk to five kids, and then find that a student is having some suicidal ideation first thing in the morning and have to support them through managing that, getting in touch with their family and managing the aftermath of that with their teachers.

Bigger events can be really difficult as well. We had a huge, traumatic event in our district with the Route 91 shooting in Las Vegas on Oct. 1, 2017. That affected a lot of families in our community. Over 500 people were shot and 59 died.

Those are big days where you’re like, ‘OK, scrap it.’ You shift gears, you’ve got to manage everything. You’ve got to take a step back [and ask yourself], ‘How are we going to support our students as a school? How are we going to support our staff?’

What does a really good day look like?

Field Day is always a really great day. We’ve had some professional athletes come — from the Golden Knights and the Raiders. They have these events where, like, 50 kids get to practice with the Raiders out in our field. We have picnics where parents come into our school, and we all go out in the field and eat with the students.

Anytime that it can feel like we’re a community, anytime we can do something big with the kids, and you just see them smiling and enjoying themselves, I would say those are my best days. There’s nothing like seeing a kid light up, to see a kid giggle. It’s soul building to see them have fun.

What is an unexpected way that your role shapes the day for kids?

School counselors are out and about all the time at our school. The day starts, and we’re in the hallways with the kids. I think knowing that there are other people in the school besides their teacher that care enough to know their name, know about their families, ask about how their soccer game went last night, know that they have a big test coming up — I think, for some kids, that’s unexpected. For some parents, that’s unexpected. And I think that makes them feel important and seen and heard.

What do you wish you could change about your school or the education system today?

I wish that more people were willing to ask questions about what we do — like you are doing — and listen to our answers.

There are a lot of assumptions about the education field currently — not just about teachers, but about my role too.

I guess if I could change something, it would be that people would listen better, because I think so many of the people [making decisions about] public schools haven’t spent any time in them, and aren’t asking good questions about what we need to support our students.

Your role gives you unique access and insight into today’s youth. What is one thing you’ve learned about young people through your work?

They just give me hope, as an adult. I think that we get super clouded in the day-to-day stuff — paying your bills and being an adult, it can be a lot. I’m not even going to get into politics and all the really scary things that can happen. But kids give me joy and hope.

I know that’s not insight, necessarily, but they remind me of all the good things in life. Even though I get to hear some of the worst things that have happened to them, they remind me of all the good things in this world. So I guess maybe my insight is that us adults need to be a little more present in our day and learn to be a little bit more like kids.