HGSE's C.A.S. Program Takes Unique Approach

Shortly after graduating HGSE with a Certificate in Advanced Study (C.A.S.), Lauran Allinson, Ed.M.’09, C.A.S.’10, got a job as a school counselor at a Denver public high school. When Allinson was handed a case load of 450 students, she could have lost her cool. Instead, she felt ready.

“What was incredible was that I felt really prepared from my program,” she says, reflecting on her experience in Prevention Science and Practice (PSP) and C.A.S. “I felt prepared to handle 450 kids because of the training I got in the program. I felt more prepared than many of my colleagues, I’d say.”

The C.A.S. in counseling is the additional year of study offered to graduates of PSP (formerly known as Risk and Prevention), who want to receive state licensure in school counseling or school adjustment counseling/school social work. In order to work as a counselor in Massachusetts (and increasingly in states throughout the country) a license is required.

Up until eight years ago, when HGSE faculty petitioned the state of Massachusetts to grant students a licensure in counseling, some alumni struggled to be hired into positions in counseling at schools. Lecturer Mandy Savitz-Romer, program director of PSP and C.A.S., explains that C.A.S. was really born out of a need to provide more opportunities to students, especially those interested in working in schools, as well as in direct response to needs expressed by students.

“We had students leaving a program with a skill set but not having access to certain jobs,” Savitz-Romer says. “After all, we are a school of education. We want our graduates to be successful in schools.”

PSP graduates interested in the C.A.S. must apply and be accepted to the program. Savitz-Romer says students are admitted based on professional and personal progress following the first year of study. To date, 65 students have graduated with a C.A.S. and have gone on to work in various settings such as schools, hospitals, and community-based or social service agencies.

Unlike traditional counseling programs that focus solely on social work or mental health, C.A.S. provides a well-rounded curriculum that is prevention focused. With schools facing challenges ranging from bullying to dropout prevention to college readiness, educators are feeling a greater need to study and earn counseling degrees that are education focused and grounded in prevention.

“The program is strength-based. We are all about looking at how to help a student find his or her best self,” says Lecturer Holly Lem. “Frequently more traditionally oriented counseling programs are predicated on a deficit-based model. Counselors have historically been tasked with trying to ‘fix’ a problem or a system’s issue. Within the C.A.S. training, there is a great deal of emphasis in encouraging the students to think holistically and systemically about how to capitalize on the many strengths of the individual or of a system and use that as a fulcrum for change. It is a paradigm shift of sorts.”

The uniqueness of the C.A.S. approach is what attracts many students to the program.

“Harvard was the only program that wasn’t solely mental health leaning. It was the only education-based program. Given that I wanted to work in a school, I feel like it was a good choice,” says current C.A.S. student James Chiarelli, Ed.M.’12, who came to the Ed School with a background working in a high school for students with social and emotional issues. “As time has gone on in the program, I feel like it was a better choice as someone who wants to work in a school. I feel having that clinical and education skillset makes me more credible school practitioner.”

Allinson agrees. Though she was initially unsure where to attend graduate school, the final decision came during an Ed School open house for accepted students. As she sat next to fellow students working in many different aspects of school from leadership to teaching to counseling, she knew it was the right place to enroll.

“I received a broad perspective on child and adolescent development and how to build appropriate interventions,” Allinson says. “A lot of colleagues don’t take the same approach to their work.”

Allinson says that often counselors and educators tend to attack the student’s problem, losing focus of his or her strengths. In doing that, she says, “then the strengths of a student get lost and don’t become part of the solution.”  In C.A.S., Allinson says she learned how to assess a student’s strengths and weaknesses, focusing on a child’s positive behavior as part of a solution.

The intensive program requires students to intern in an educational or community setting for 20 hours per week while still taking a full course load. Lem coordinates internships site placements and also teaches an advanced practicum that works in conjunction with the internship. The site placement is an individualized process in which Lem meets with each student to discuss the experience.

“Frequently, students want to ‘fill in some gaps,’ such as working with a different age group or population than they worked with in their previous placement,” Lem says. “Other students are quite sure about their interests and want to discover new challenges in working with a similar population.”

The placement process entails students interviewing at multiple sites before they accept an offer. “Our partnerships are now an interesting mix of urban and suburban, elementary, middle school, and high school,” Lem says, noting that it has grown from five sites to more than 30. “I place the students at their respective sites and act as the school liaison for the sites. This entails conducting two site visits a year, having supervisor meetings, and also troubleshooting if there is an issue on site.”

Then students work in close contact with a site supervisor who provides students with direction, professional guidance, and oversees their work. “C.A.S. students rely on their supervisors for feedback on their development and progress as they continue to refine their skills and expertise,” Savitz-Romer says. “All of our supervisors have been practicing in the field for several years. The success of the advanced practicum experiences depends on our school partners who share responsibility for educating and training our students.”

Sharon Cho, Ed.M.’07, C.A.S.’08, who came to HGSE with a psychology degree, relished the chance to work in two different settings. In year one, she went from working in a high school with virtually no school counseling department to the C.A.S. internship where she focused on college readiness at a different school with a strong school counseling department. “Having two years of experience was helpful in shaping my work today,” she says.

“It’s hard to put theory into practice,” says Cho, who currently works as a school counselor for an urban public high school. “I think because I did internships while in the program, it really helps me to think about these issues and a lot of what I learned at the time has carried though into practice.”

This fall Cho took on a new role as a site supervisor of a C.A.S. student.

“It is exciting in the last few years that we have been able to start using our C.A.S. alums as site supervisors,” Lem says. “This has a dual advantage of both supporting our alums and also, providing our current students with high-quality supervision. We are looking forward to increasing our expanding pool of C.A.S. alums as supervisors in the next few years.”

The internship along with the training students receive using an “ecological systems framework,” which, Savitz-Romer notes, honors “multiple contexts in which children and adolescents learn and develop” really sets C.A.S. apart. And, the alums of the program agree.

“HGSE has a holistic approach to working with students,” Cho says. “This is something that I believe very strongly in – recognizing that kids aren’t just islands.”