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School Counselor's Ability To Advocate For The Pregnant Student

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As a school counselor, my first priority is to advocate for the pregnant student, to help her through the tough decisions. My purpose is to help the student feel empowered and be responsive to her needs. A one size fits all policy undermines the school counselor's ability to advocate for the student. While I believe most counselors will encourage the student to involve her parents and even offer to be present, or make phone calls to parents on the students behalf, telling parents is not always in the best interest of the student. If a school policy forces the counselor to breach the confident of the student, then the student will be less likely to trust adults at the school and could feel they have no one to turn to. Telling parents …show more content…

I asked her if her mother knew and she didn’t. I took her to the nurse, as she was not feeling well, and they discussed how to make sure she was pregnant and how to take care of herself at this point. I suggested that she tell her mom, and she was very fearful of how angry her mom was going to be. I recommended that she tell her mother. The next day she still had not told her mother, so we practiced what she would say and what she thought her mom’s reply would be. She did communicate with her mom, and her mother was disappointed but supportive. After all that the student was not pregnant. However, I never once thought about breaking this student’s confidence. I felt it was more important that she feel confident I was an adult she could turn to. Then work things out where she could tell her mom when she was ready. I hope that I will be able to handle things like that in the future. I believe that school counselors should have the power to evaluate each situation as a case by case scenario, circumstances are different and a school-wide policy could hamper the counselor’s ability to advocate for the very person who needs her

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