Marathon Resilience: Overcoming Challenges in Rural School Counseling

Hey there, school counselor, welcome back to the School for School Counselors podcast. I'm Steph Johnson, your host, glad to be back with you for another week and I have an interesting question for you. I think this is really going to resonate, especially this time of the school year. Do you ever feel like you are running an unwinnable race? Ouch, have you ever been there? I know this time of year feels just like that. We feel like we're going a hundred miles an hour, running around like our hair is on fire, trying to attend all the needs, and sometimes we feel like where does it get us? Where do we end up? Sometimes even what's the point? Right, we know we're there to make huge impacts for students. We know we're invested in futures and we want to do a great job. But sometimes, after you've been running a while, you start to feel a little tired, you start to feel a little bit disillusioned, you start to lose your motivation and then it gets really, really hard to keep your eyes on the finish line.

I had the honor just a few months ago to keynote an online conference for the Lone Star State School Counselor Association Rural Route School Counselors Conference, and I was so honored that they asked me to keynote their event. It's a really, really cool collaboration of rural school counselors from all over the state of Texas. I was thinking about that tremendous opportunity. It happened a couple of months ago and I thought, you know, as we're nearing the end of this school year, we're getting tired, we are feeling beaten down, we're having trouble looking for that finish line and feeling like we're going to make it. So I thought I might share a little piece of my keynote speech with you, because, even if you do not work in a rural area, you're likely feeling some of these same things. So I'm going to cut to the keynote speech. I hope you love it. I hope it helps inspire you and reinvigorate you for the remainder of the school year ahead.

We're going to go ahead and get started with our keynote speaker, steph Johnson. So two years ago I started listening to School for School Counselors and I learned about it at the Alaska conference. Somebody said hey, you know, I listened to a cool podcast and this is called School for School Counselors Check it out. And so I started listening to it and I listened to my first like four episodes on the way home from Alaska, because you know I'm not from the city. I had to drive four and a half hours back home. So I listened to like four episodes back to back to back and started following Steph on Facebook and threw out a shot in the dark earlier this fall and asked her if she might want to keynote our rule route and she happily said yes, and I'm so thankful for her, but I just want to introduce her.

So Steph is a veteran educator of over 25 years, full-time public school counselor right now, and a licensed therapist. Steph Johnson is passionate about advocating not only for children's mental health but for more stability and access to healthy school counselors within equitable and ethical systems. So amen to that. As the founder of School for School Counselors and the host of the School for School Counselors podcast, with over 115,000 downloads to date. Steph brings real world truth and insight with a heaping dust of empowerment, advocacy and motivation to anyone in the business of supporting students in schools. So, steph, thank you so much for being here today. I'm excited to hear from you.

Hey y'all. I was so glad to be here. I cannot tell you how honored and humbled I am. I'm just going to jump right in this morning and tell you about a crazy idea that I had once back in my younger days. I decided I was going to run a marathon. I was going to run 26.2 miles and if you know me, you know I'm not athletic. I don't like to sweat, I don't like the outdoors and only five hundredths of one percent of all people on the planet have ever run a marathon. So the idea of me running one pretty laughable. When I came home and told my husband what I planned to do, he looked at me. It was kind of strange and he said oh OK, I'll support you whenever you want to do. But I'm sure in the back of his mind he was thinking what are you doing? It was crazy.

I could not run around the block when I made this decision, but I was committed and I was going to do it. So I showed up for my first training run about a week later and the coach said we're going to do an easy training run, only three miles, a mile and a half out, a mile and a half back. And I was a little overwhelmed hearing that because, again, I was not a runner. So everybody took off running down the road and of course they shot ahead of me. I was plodding along behind them. I was walking more than I was running and I got maybe a third of the way down the first leg of the route and the people who had passed me had turned around and were coming back to let me again. So the coach stops and he says hey, let's take this a little slower. How about we turn around right here and take it on in? And I was mortified, but with time and intentionality I got better and better at running. I had a training schedule to follow, I watched my nutrition, I managed my sleep schedule and through all of those things got better and better and better. I ended up completing not just one marathon, but five. I ended up completing not just one marathon, but five. I never became a fast runner. I wasn't an elite athlete by any stretch of the imagination, don't get that impression. But I was always. I always had fun, I always enjoyed the race. I didn't care that I was one of the slowest runners, because in those events I had some of the coolest experiences of my life. In those events I had some of the coolest experiences of my life. You guys may not have ever trained to run a marathon, but you probably feel like you're running one every single day, right? So in the chat here in the Zoom room, let me know the average intensity you feel like your day meets One to five, with five being endurance, athlete level, and one being piece of cake, laying on the beach enjoying life. What do you think? What's the average intensity of your typical day? I can't wait to see what you say. I see your scale is not large enough. We need to go up to 20. Absolutely, yeah, because we run and we work hard. Right, I'm getting lots of numbers above five. I get it, I get it Y'all. We're waking up early, we're getting all of our gear prepared, we're getting our coffee ready, we've got grab and go foods, because we don't know if we're going to sit and eat during the day. We probably got our running shoes on, literally, and you know the general route of your day, but you don't know the obstacles or the challenges that you're going to face along that direction. Right, you have no idea what's going to jump in the road in front of you. Let's see. Average is definitely a 4.9. I see in the chat. I love that too. That's so funny. So as the race goes on maybe your race goes on for a day, a week, a year, sometimes many years we end up feeling tired. Sometimes we feel like we end up hitting a wall at some point in our school counseling race. If you don't know what hitting the wall is, it's a running turn that comes into play, typically around mile 20 or 21. It's where you feel like you completely lose your ability to do anything. You can't put one foot in front of the other, you can't encourage yourself and think your way out of this hole. You're just done. You're completely and totally depleted and you can't use your mindset, you can't use your grit, you can't use your determination. They're gone and you almost feel like you can't speak even. It's a huge, huge mental game, and so you may get there at some point in your school counseling career and wonder how am I going to get these kids across the finish line Right? Have you ever been there? And then particularly in rural school counseling? That was a race unlike any other. It makes me think of a race that I ran one time in the foothills of the Sandian Mountains in Albuquerque. It was, hands down, the most beautiful race I ever ran. My running partner and I were on track with lots of other runners but, as it always happened because, remember, we were slow we started falling toward the back of the race and before the sun even rose over the tops of the mountains, we were out there all by ourselves. We were falling behind. We were always prepared to be slow. That never bothered us. We always had a good time. But in this particular race we had passed up by a man who had been ready at the starting line that he was running to celebrate his 75th birthday. And we also got passed up by a woman who was six months pregnant. She had her little belly over her running shorts and I can just remember feeling incredulous as they soon passed us and I thought really we can't hang with them. But y'all, sometimes I think that's how it feels when you're counseling in a rural school setting, because it feels like everybody is just moving along a little bit faster, a little bit more effortlessly, a little more easily than you are in your location. So I'm interested to know if you've ever felt like you've been there. I see lots of people in the chat saying, yes, right, it's a real thing. And you start to think that if you only had more resources, if you had more people on your campus to help take up some of the slack, if you had more money, if you had less hats to wear, then finally, maybe you would get a chance to raise like that too. Y'all, I'm Steph Johnson. I'm so glad to be here with you today again. I'm a full-time school counselor, just like you. Host of the School for School Counselors podcast. I'm a professional school counseling mentor and I'm a licensed therapist, and I've been privileged to walk through the doors of public education for over 25 years and I've never, ever regretted it. One of the driving forces in my work these days is to educate, empower and advocate for school counselors all over the country, and no group of school counselors has my heart more than those of you working in rural settings. I know what it's like because I've been one too, and the Rural School Counseling Challenge is interesting and there's a really cool exercise I remember doing with a student back once, a young lady who was just feeling the weight of the world on her shoulders, and of course I can't go into a lot of detail about her circumstances, but I can tell you that a lot of the things that she was carrying were things that she didn't necessarily even really have a responsibility for. Her worries were not hers. And so, trying to talk her through this, working through it, really trying to determine what kinds of specific things she actually needed to concern herself with, in the course of one day we started pulling books off my bookshelf and every time she would name a responsibility that didn't belong to her, we would write it on a sticky her, we would write it on a sticky note and we would put it on a book and we started stacking those books on top of my desk and praise, saying that stack was a high. And we looked at it and I said you know what let's do? Let's take all these books and let's load them up into a backpack. So we loaded them in a backpack and I asked the student to put the backpack on and immediately once she had it on, she was like this is heavy. And I said, yeah, look at all the things that you've been carrying around, that have been weighing you down, and you could just see this look pass across her face Like, oh, I love it when I see that. Look on students' faces, don't you? I mean, it's just when the light bulb comes on and we're like, okay, we're getting somewhere. Point is, I think you're carrying a backpack like that too, and I don't want to generalize too much, because I know that school counseling in a rural area doesn't necessarily mean that all of your students are poor. Area doesn't necessarily mean that all of your students are poor. It doesn't necessarily mean that all of their parents are addicted to drugs or that everybody's having a hard time, but at the same time, we know that statistically, we have a greater chance of seeing those kinds of things in our student populations. The challenges are formidable, and carrying backpacks full of lots of challenges is just kind of what we do every day. Lee and team 2009 found that rural communities struggle most to serve internalizing concerns so things like depression and anxiety and that the services that are actually most often needed are wraparound mental health supports for siblings and families. I bet you see that every day, don't you? Blackstock and Team 2018 found that rural students are more likely to be medicated for mental health concerns than to attend counseling, and most often their medications are prescribed by practitioners that do not have strong mental health backgrounds. So people like their PCPs, or sometimes an urgent care physician, and Foster and Team 2019 found that medication was less effective than counseling for adolescents with mild to moderate depression. Then we see an increased likelihood of adverse side effects, like elevated suicidal ideation, which then leads them to discontinuing their medication, and on and on and on. And we know that Just spreading the things that we see and hear every day. If we don't address the root of the issue, it's hard to solve the problem right. And access to long-term services in your community are probably limited. It may be difficult for parents to get their children to an office, and those barriers may not even necessarily be completely economic. Some of our more affluent families have trouble traveling in and out of major cities just due to time, work constraints, planting schedules, all these kinds of things. So this is not just about our struggling families, this is about everybody. And it's a huge concern for school counselors because we know the power of counseling interventions. But maybe parents might feel like it's just easier to give it to a pill in the morning, to smoosh it out, mix it in some applesauce, than to have to go through all the rigmarole that's involved in getting them invested in some face-to-face counseling relationships and we see the fallout of that in our schools all the time, and it's a shame. There can also be a huge stigma in rural populations about mental health interventions. Studies say that the more stigma parents perceive, the less willing they are to utilize mental health supports for their children, no matter the nature of the concern or how long it's been going on. So when you think about our landscapes, where we probably typically prize things like ruggedness, self-reliance, pride, rural parents are going to worry about how their students are going to be judged or that they will be perceived negatively as parents. There's tons of things y'all going on here in the literature and the research. That's my jam and again, I know that you see this each and every day when you go to work. So let me know, in the chat, I've seen some people piping up is this your reality? Is this what you're seeing now too? Students with inadequate mental health care, students who have challenges and barriers in accessing them, and some stigmas in your community about accessing mental health. I'm seeing things like most definitely in the chat. I think we're kind of all in that boat. So, while this isn't new news to you, it is worth thinking about a little bit and reminding ourselves of as we go through our work every day. We have this mental health access in our backpacks, for sure, but we may also be serving students in food deserts. You're a food desert if you are more than 10 miles away from the nearest supermarket, super center or large grocery store. You're more than 10 miles away from access to fresh foods. That's a problem, and your students need access to good food in a timely manner. Often we're the ones that provide that. We're called to help intervene. So add that to the backpack. You may be serving neighborhoods or households in geographic isolation, and I'm not talking about accessing services anymore. I'm talking about secrets. Greater distance equals a better ability to keep secrets. There are fewer neighbors to help when things go wrong. There are fewer eyes and ears on the situation, and we are working with very independent, rugged folks who feel like they don't need or don't want anybody's help. So sometimes it comes along as pride, but sometimes it's secrecy. Add that in the backpack and on the school counseling side of things, we have tons of needs vying for our attention, especially since students in rural settings access school-based mental health services twice as often as specialty mental health care. Those are the reasons we've already mentioned, but as we look to our students' mental health, we're hit with a ton of role confusion because in our school counseling graduate programs, we're led to believe that we're going to be able to follow a comprehensive school counseling program model and that we will be able to implement it from day one and that everybody involved is going to be so thankful and supportive. That's not always the case. Transpose that into a rural setting and then it gets even more confusing because we all pitch in. We work as a family. We are all part of this community. You guys heard that Bain and Team 2011 found that school counselors in rural Texas are spending the majority of their time performing duties other than counseling, such as administrative duties, academic advising, even teaching classes. We have all this role confusion and we know we need to help out and that there isn't anybody else to do these jobs, but yet we know that the job that we showed up wanting to do we can't get done. And then in our rural settings, we experience a lack of access to professional consultation. You guys are great at building networks for this I know because you're here. You're here on a Saturday in a conference to learn, to grow and to develop a network. As a rural school counselor, I think that is absolutely amazing, but you have to admit it hits different when you can walk through a hallway and just stop and say to somebody hey, I've been thinking about something, what do you think? It's a whole different dynamic. So these challenges in these rural schools, all of these things that we're carrying around in our backpacks, are on top of all of the traditional challenges of school counseling. To begin with, misutilization, high caseload, budget cuts, skyrocketing mental health and behavior concerns, especially since COVID. Parental apathy, parental confusion, 504, testing, clerical the list goes on and on and on and on. A 2011 survey of rural school counselors revealed that 89% experienced some degree of burnout. And y'all, that was 2011,. Before COVID, before all of the after effects that we're seeing so prevalently on our campuses right now. So we're carrying these backpacks on our backs every day, with all of these things weighing us down, and still we continue moving through the hallways serving our students, serving our families, trying to find solutions and get our students across the finish line. That gives me chills just thinking about that. I remember driving out to the rural community. That sticks out most in my mind. It was about a 25-minute drive out of town, watching for deer, dodging the wildlife down the two-lane road, and there was no stoplight or even a stop sign in front of our school. We had went about three-quarters of a mile down on the road and I bet we had a lot of the challenges out there that you have on your campuses. We were literally surrounded by cotton fields. I don't mean the community, I mean the school itself. We had a small row of houses directly across the street. Most of those were staff housing, and then there wasn't really anything else out there. No convenience stores, no anything. No community centers, nothing. I remember fishing snakes out of the copy machine. They liked it because it was warm. We had scum in the building over our breaks. We had a family of foxes that liked to drop through the ceiling every now and again. I don't know what I'm talking about. You probably chased your fair amount of critters out of the building. Don't know what I'm talking about? You probably chased your fair amount of critters out of the building. We got students from places like the one that I named, the complex, or another area that everyone calls the pig pen, and yes, that is as ominous as it sounds. We had personnel that carried pistols on campus because the emergency response was 20 minutes away. And as I'm talking, I'm sure that you are picturing some aspects of your own campus, right? I was responsible for school counseling, as well as coordinating STAR, student support, team 504, student testing, weekend food program, on and on and on, and I was responsible for a lot of those things because there wasn't anybody else that could do them. It was also a very, very cool community, very tight-knit. Our elementary and secondary school were connected in one strip of buildings. My superintendent was almost right next door to me and so he was always willing to jump in, as well as the rest of our staff just the best group of people you ever hope to work with and all were extremely committed to the success of our students. But there were some things I wasn't prepared for. When I started rural school counseling, I wasn't prepared for the actual levels of trauma that I would see and experience. Looking back, I think maybe that was naivete a little bit. I knew that I was going to see some trauma, because that's what you deal with as a counselor, right, but I didn't realize the level or the intensity of what I was going to experience. I didn't realize that I would be focusing so heavily on coordinating services, almost like a case manager or a social worker. It was not too long ago. A couple of weeks back, I made myself a new name badge that said behavioral health case manager. It was funny, that day I'll do what I mean. Name badge that said behavioral health case manager. It was one of those days I'll do what I mean. I wasn't prepared also for what geographical limitations really meant From my perspective as an outsider. Coming in, I thought you know just the miles, right, it just took a little bit longer to drive in and out of town. I didn't realize the practicalities of that Families who save gas in case they have to get to town in an emergency, only making a certain amount of trips because it was so expensive, not having the time or the initiative to coordinate appointments doctor, dentist, grocery store rents all in one day that's almost impossible these days. And I wasn't prepared for the amount of adult support that needed to be provided, and I think this is a distinguishing factor in rural settings. The increased needs of support that some of our adults need relative to our school settings are pretty high. And in our communities, if we don't help who is. When you're working in rural schools, you're up against a lot and unless you're someone that's run the race like we have, carrying this backpack of all this extra weight, it's something that you really just don't get. You don't get it until you've done it. I think and I'm so grateful that you guys are here at this conference I think it's amazing that these folks have put this together and it's brought you guys all into one space to collaborate, to network and to learn together. I think it's pretty phenomenal. You know, we don't begrudge people for running a race different than ours. It's the same reason. I didn't give the stink eye to the pregnant lady or the 75-year-old that passed me when we were running the race. I recognized that our race was different and it's the same. In rural school counseling, we're all headed toward the same goal as school counselors of getting healthy, well-adjusted young adults across the finish line. But our challenges, the way we approach our race strategy, the way we sustain ourselves along the journey, they're all very different. Along the journey, they're all very different. Hey, so I hope you enjoyed that excerpt from my keynote speech. Went on about half an hour more after that. It was a lengthy speech but, man, it felt like it went by in the blink of an eye. Such an amazing audience, such a wonderful event, and I am so grateful and so humbled to have been part of it. Keep your eye on the finish line. My friends, as you just heard me talk about, we all have different challenges, we all have different obstacles in the races that we're running, and it's going to look like some people are going a little bit faster than us, that maybe are being a little more successful than we are, and sometimes we feel like we're just plodding along right, barely putting one foot in front of the other. But you need to remember this no matter how tired you feel, no matter how disillusioned you're feeling or just plain questioning yourself for signing up for this race in the first place, you're making a difference. With every step you take toward that finish line with those students, you are making an impact. You are making a difference, even if people aren't stopping to tell you. You need to know in your heart and in your soul that you're doing work you've been called to do and that it makes a tremendous difference for the students and the families that you serve. I, for one, could not be more grateful for the work that you do each and every day and I want you to know I see you. Hang on, my friend. The finish line is in sight. We have just a few more months and we're going to get to see these amazing young people step up into the next level of their education or their careers, and it's going to be so sweet, it's going to be wonderful to watch and you're going to know that you were a part of it. Stay strong, keep your eyes on the finish line, stay motivated, and I'll be back soon with another episode of the School for School Counselors podcast. Until then, I hope you have the best week. Take care.