The Northern Kentucky University School Counseling Program is collaborating with the NKU Center for Educator Excellence and the Ronald H. Fredrickson Center for School Counseling Outcome Research and Evaluation at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst to present the third annual national Evidence-Based School Counseling Conference March 26 – 27 at the NKU METS Center for Corporate Learning, 3861 Olympic Blvd. in Erlanger.
The conference is expected to draw attendees from 29 states across the country. The conference focuses on equipping professional school counselors with the skills to choose evidence-based interventions and the tools to evaluate the effectiveness of existing programs by measuring the impact of interventions on critical measurements such as test scores, grade-point-averages, post-secondary going rates, attendance rates, office referrals and drop-out rates.
“In a time of high-stakes standardized testing, this conference offers a return to examining which social, emotional, interpersonal and college/career interventions positively impact student achievement,” said Dr. Brett Zyromski, associate professor and director of the NKU School Counseling Program.
Experts from across the country serve on the advisory council and act in leadership roles at the Evidence-Based School Counseling Conference. The cross-political conference creates a common vision of disseminating what works to help students achieve success with representation from the American School Counselor Association, American Counseling Association, Education Trust’s Transforming School Counseling Initiative and the College Board’s National Office for School Counselor Advocacy.
Keynote speakers for this year’s conference are Dr. Trish Hatch and four recognized ASCA Model Program Award-Winning School Counselors – Alka Howard, Jacquie Naughton, Dylan Hackbarth, and Debra Brown.
Professional school counseling faculty from across the country will lead discussions about what works in professional school counseling, how it works, how to measure that it works and which critical data elements are impacted. A focus on using data to evaluate the impact of social and emotional interventions has quickly gained traction across the country and internationally, with educational leaders in Italy, Malaysia, South Korea, and Turkey consulting with CSCORE and other advisory council leaders to evolve their own evidence-based data-driven comprehensive school counseling practices.
“The two main gaps in school counseling today relate to administrators’ lack of knowledge about how to gain the highest impact from school counseling interventions and professional school counselors’ lack of skills in program evaluation,” said Zyromski. “This conference will help to illustrate how school counseling interventions impact student achievement.”
Zyromski said the conference addresses both gaps and is thus ideal for professional school counselors, school administrators, state education leaders, and school counselor educators.
From NKU