Predicting a school’s population has always proven to be a challenging ordeal. Students move out of the area and prospective students move in, so being able to assess the best manner in which to serve the school is quite an arduous task. However, many seniors are upset with the recent decision to change counselor assignments as a result of fluctuating enrollment.

This past year, a counselor’s assignment could have been to counsel students with last names Cor-Fue. Now, that same counselor might have an assignment of Del-Gan. In this situation, those with last names beginning with Cor-Dek might now have a different counselor, change that has provoked apprehension.

For many students, most interactions with their counselors entail only course selection changes. For such an important component of determining one’s future high school education, it is important for a counselor to understand a student’s strengths and weaknesses. Therefore, this change it is even more alarming for seniors.

“If a counselor doesn’t know you well, [he/she] will not be able to write a good recommendation that represents who you are,” senior Danielle Turner said. Many seniors who are applying to colleges ask their counselors to write them a recommendation. Those that have new counselors this year fear that they will not be apt to write truly resounding recommendations for their students.

“The counselor alpha assignment had to change because the county only staffed our school this year with nine counselors, and a SAM counselor,” Director of Jennifer Crump-Strawderman said.

Crump-Strawderman went on to add that the AHS counselor staff was downsized from ten counselors to nine counselors this year. This number is based on enrollment. The students were re-distributed amongst the counselors.

“In order to equitably distribute the students among all the counselors, we did not exempt the upperclassmen. The upperclassmen who had [Emarinn] Oundee were going to have to have a new counselor. To prevent the overflowing of students to the remaining counselors, everyone had to be moved. If the upperclassmen kept their former counselor and those counselors absorbed the students from Mr. Oundee, some counselors would have a significantly higher student load than other counselors,” Crump-Strawderman said.

“In addition, the county mandates the counselor to student ratio and we cannot exceed that ratio. If the counselors kept their former alphabet plus absorbed Mr. Oundee’s alphabet, there would be several counselors above the county mandated ratio. The good news is that, as a department, we are all working together to share information on our former students,” Crump-Strawderman said.

Although these changes are understandable in the context of the short turn-around the student services department had this past summer, those seniors who had counselors still working at AHS and were re-assigned should have been able to remain with their counselors.

To account for the difference, a larger amount of younger students should have faced changes.

“These counselors have been with you for problems you might have had in your school career,” Turner said.

For students also utilize counselors as a source of advice with personal issues. For some students with problems that require much background and understanding, a new counselor may not be able to address the problem as effectively as a student’s previous counselor could have.

While changing counselors might not be detrimental to underclassmen, seniors should remain exempt from such changes.

When grades and class enrollment matter most, students should be able to rely on a counselor who is versed in a student’s background and abilities.