Allison – high school graduate; Bovaird
Foundation Scholarship recipient

cademics can quickly become secondary to our students due to life situations beyond their control.  Counseling has always been a critical program.  The founders realized that if the student’s personal and emotional problems were not addressed, then the ability to focus on academics could continue to be affected.  Counselors meet with their respective students daily to determine if any student has immediate needs that must be addressed.  Students meet regularly with the six full-time counselors for crisis intervention, individual and group psychotherapy and participate in up to four group counseling sessions each week.  Family counseling is offered continuously as needed, and a parent support group is offered each month.  Students and families placed on our waiting list are offered individual and/or family counseling.

Counselors run several groups to meet the different needs of the students. These groups include: women’s issues (designed for our female students who have been or who currently are in abusive situations), recreation (students participate in and learn about healthy activities), drug/alcohol intervention (assisting students to become clean and sober), drug/alcohol information (designed for students attempting to remain clean and sober), HIV/AIDS Pregnancy Prevention (Red Cross trained students present information to Street School students and to other at-risk youth), and anger management (assists students in conflict resolution techniques). Often, the severity of a teenager’s problem is not known until sufficient time is spent in counseling. Frequently, problems will surface at this school, which have been virtually unaddressed in public schools or the student’s home. Many of the parents and families of these youth are in need of being linked with essential community social service resources. The counselors attempt to impact the entire family system in order to help reduce problematic behavior.