Monday, February 3, 2025
“Helping Students Thrive” is the theme of this year’s National School Counseling Week, February 3-7. This week, be sure to recognize the work of the dedicated school counselors who are serving Milwaukee Public Schools students and helping them thrive. School counselors make both an immediate and lasting impact on MPS students, and they are found all across the district.
Take the counseling program at Ronald Wilson Reagan College Preparatory High School, which recently won statewide accolades: It is one of only seven in the state this year to receive the prestigious Program of Promise designation from the Wisconsin School Counselor Association (WSCA), after school counselors showed the impact their program had at Reagan High School. To be recognized as a Program of Promise, counseling teams must highlight three specific interventions their program implemented during the previous school year.
For one of the interventions highlighted, Reagan school counselors Dan Buschmann, Sarah Dubey, Lauren Eierman, Kon Knueppel, and Sarah Moore identified an equity gap in academic achievement — and, through a team approach including teachers, parents, and case managers, supported students in dramatically reducing this gap within one semester.
In the fall of 2023, the school counselors found that students with two or more failing grades in the first quarter included 12% of the 9th-grade class and a disproportionally higher percentage of students of color.
The school counselors’ actions helped students decrease the number of failing grades by a remarkable 84%. Here’s how they did it:
The team developed and led four social and academic intervention groups (SAIGs), where small groups of students worked with their counselor on time management and organizational and study skills for 30 minutes once a week for six weeks. The school counselors checked in with the 9th graders individually, as well, for 10 minutes, as needed.
Skills included showing the students how to effectively use the planners they receive at the start of the school year, and showing them how to prioritize a long to-do list (do things that will have the biggest impact on a grade; don’t not do anything when the list overwhelms you, for example).
In addition, the school counselors coached students on self-advocacy skills. Those newfound skills helped the students take the lead in communicating with their teachers.
“A lot of kids don’t ask for help, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t need it,” Moore observed. She taught the last 20 years in MPS before becoming a school counselor this year, graduating with a master’s degree in school counseling in August.
Reagan’s school counselors broadened the safety net for students, working with teachers, special education case managers, and parents to support students in managing their new skills.
The process had a side benefit: The 9th graders in the small group said they were more confident about choosing effective learning strategies on their own, the school counselors reported.
Eierman and Moore said they could see the confidence and excitement grow among students in the group as momentum grew, and as a U became a D, and a D rose to a C. Confidence is important, Eierman noted. It empowers students.
And the application process for the Program of Promise recognition benefited the school counselors, as well, Moore observed. “As colleagues, we were able to grow a lot stronger,” she said, as the team was pushed to be data-driven and evidence-based in their interventions.
A crucial time
Students in their first year of high school often need extra support, and school counselors intervene in the very first quarter to help set up students for success. First-quarter grades are more of a progress report — students still have time to turn things around for their semester grades.
“There’s still time to recover, bounce back, and thrive,” Moore said.
Eierman noted that teachers will communicate with families when students are having difficulty; if high school students are failing multiple classes, it can feel overwhelming, especially if they’re trying to turn around grades all on their own.
Reagan students come from 52 schools around the district. Some of them spent all their school years at one school, kindergarten through 8th grade, and arrive at high school having gone from knowing everyone to knowing no one. School counselors can be another adult at school with whom students can connect, in addition to their teachers. “We’re adding on another layer of support,” Eierman said.
In making the transition to high school, students are juggling eight classes with eight teachers and might not have the time-management and organizational skills they need. “That’s our wheelhouse,” Eierman said.
Getting to know the students is vital, Moore indicated. She might plan to provide a student with a study skill, but conversation with the student reveals a different need, or a different barrier — transportation to school, for instance, or sleep schedules.
Next steps
Based on their success last year, the Reagan school counselors continued the academic SAIGs. They focused on closing the gap for special education students and expanded the groups to include students earning 4 or more Ds on the 1st quarter report card. The groups met for nine weeks instead of six to extend support to the end of the 1st semester. The Reagan school counselors again will be examining the data and evaluating the results.
Later in February, with the support of MPS School Counseling Manager Ophelia King, the Reagan school counseling team will lead a session with colleagues from across the district to share their progress toward becoming a data-driven Program of Promise.
People recall their experiences with school counselors while growing up, perhaps mainly as career guidance, or guidance after a spot of trouble at school. Today, school counselors play multiple roles, supporting students’ development academically, vocationally, and personally. Eierman views the MPS model as proactive — that is, school counselors are not waiting for students to come to them. Rather, they are reaching out to help students succeed.
What is the Program of Promise?
Only a small number of Wisconsin schools receive the Program of Promise award each year. It is the highest recognition that the Wisconsin School Counselor Association bestows on data-driven comprehensive school counseling programs.
For a school’s program to be considered, school counselors must submit an accountability report that meets the association’s stringent expectations for data. The report must show the school counseling program's impact on students' academic, social-emotional, and career development. A panel of school counseling professionals reviews the reports, which are known as the Wisconsin School Counseling Accountability Report (WSCPAR).
Awards are given to the school counseling programs whose reports show they meet or exceed requirements.
The Reagan High School counselors and the other state winners will be recognized during the National School Counselor Week WSCA breakfast on Friday, February 7. The submission deadline for the 2026 Program of Promise designation is November 24, 2025.