The Guidance Department will be reorganizing for the 2012-2013 school year by appointing one college counselor and having the other three remain personal counselors.

Guidance counselors Carol Heflin-Shupe, Larry Hensley, and Kathy Barnes will remain personal guidance counselors handling student scheduling and personal issues, while Carrie Siemsen will become the full-time college counselor handling solely college affairs such as: application processing, athletic signing, and scholarship information. In the past, all of the college and personal guidance was shared among the four counselors.

“The college counselor will be responsible for almost all things college-related. I will be meeting with each junior individually and I’ll be teaching the junior guidance lessons, just like we’ve done before. But they are going to be done a little differently,” Siemsen said.

According to Siemsen, all of the current students she counsels now will be divided amongst the three remaining counselors. When the class of 2016 arrives, Siemsen will not counsel a group of freshmen.

There will only be one college-related task that the remaining three personal counselors will be responsible for next year. According to Siemsen, all of the letters of recommendation from the Guidance Department will be written by all four counselors, just like in past years.

According to Principal Madelyn Ball, a reason for establishing the college counselor position was to increase interest in JC.

“It’s hard for me to market us as a college prep school without a designated college counselor, because the other schools have so many. I think NDP [Notre Dame Preparatory High School] has something like nine counselors,” Ball said.

According to Siemsen, Ball has a few main goals that she would like Siemsen to accomplish in her new position.

“I know that Ms. Ball would like one of my goals to be to expand students’ options a bit, whether that means regionally or competitively or academically. With this program, they are hoping to have students to apply to and hopefully attend colleges that are farther away or more challenging,” Siemsen said.

Another addition to the guidance rearrangement is the beginning of the College Center. Next year, the College Center will be located in the current library work room.

“Kids can go in and have a quiet place to do college research.  We’re going to put all of the college material in that room. Any college representative that comes to talk to kids will meet in that room,” Siemsen said.

“I also personally think that one person doing college counseling, and that being the only job that they have to do, will help the program. I think I can work more closely with athletics. I really believe, now that I’ve started, that the program can improve with one person focusing solely on college counseling,” Siemsen said.

However, the junior class has reacted by worrying about the amount of work on Siemsen’s plate. “I think she’s going to be overwhelmed. We have like 160 people in our class. I think it’s just too much work for one person,” junior Elliott Weinberg said.

Despite the solid division between college counseling and personal counseling, Siemsen and Ball are both aware that the two may overlap in the future.

“You can’t absolutely separate college counseling and personal counseling. The counselors are always doing college stuff,” Ball said.

The junior class is concerned about the division between the two counseling fields. “I like it, but at the same time I’ve developed a more personal relationship with my guidance counselor, so I feel like they know us better,” junior Kyleigh Daiker said.

“The kids are supposed to come to me with college questions. They don’t have to though. If they feel more comfortable with their personal counselors, that’s fine,” Siemsen.

Maggie Cassidy is Print Chief for The Patriot and jcpatriot.com.