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School Counseling Corner Newsletter - 2nd Edition
Published on Jan 22, 2017 10:20
School Counseling Corner Newsletter
Welcome to the second edition of the School Counseling Corner Newsletter. We wanted to provide you with some updates as we usher in 2017 and head toward the second half of the school year.
Contact Information:
Millis High School
School Counseling Office
245 Plain Street
Millis, MA 02054
CEEB Code #: 221425
School Counseling Phone: 508-376-7023
School Counseling Fax: 508-376-7020
Twitter: @MHS1Counseling
Website: http://millispshs.ss9.sharpschool.com/for_students/counseling
College Planning Night for Juniors and Parents is February 2
The School Counseling Office is excited to announce that our College Planning Night for junior students and parents will be held on February 2, 2017, starting at 6:30pm in the auditorium. The school counselors will begin the night with a brief presentation on the college planning process followed by a college admissions panel presentation. Representatives from Bryant University, UMass-Amherst, Boston College, Suffolk University, and Massachusetts Bay Community College are expected to be on hand to discuss the college admissions process and take questions from parents and students. This promises to be a great night you don’t want to miss, where both parents and students will take away a host of useful information as our juniors begin the college/post-secondary search process.
Free Online ACT Prep Session
Attention Juniors - on Wednesday, January 4, the ACT and Kaplan Online Prep Live hosted a free ACT test prep event. Instructors outlined the most commonly tested concepts on the ACT and provided an overview of the interactive instruction available through ACT Kaplan Online Prep Live. You can find a free recording of the presentation by clicking here.
Small School, Big Future Conference - Volunteers Needed!
On March 8, 2017, Millis High School will be hosting our first-ever "Small School, Big Future Conference" from 8:00am-10:50am. The goal of our conference is to give MHS students the opportunity to learn about different careers as well as life and "real world" skills that will be helpful to them after high school. One component of the day will be a career fair in our gym, where presenters will set up displays and engage with students as they walk around and learn about different jobs/businesses/organizations. Another component of the day will consist of 20-30 minute workshops in classrooms, where presenters will provide interactive seminars to small groups of students on topics that will benefit them in their lives after high school.
Now, this is the part where you come in, as we need participation from the always supportive Millis community and friends! We are looking for parents, community members and professionals in the area who are willing to be presenters in either the fair portion of the day, or the interactive workshops, or both. Right now, we are focused on filling up the fair portion of our day, and would love to have more people on board to set up a table/interactive display to highlight their careers, businesses or professions. If you are interested, please fill out the following survey https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/X2PQRH2 and we will be in touch. Please feel free to forward the link to the survey and the information from this email to anyone you think would be interested in being a part of our conference. Thank you in advance for taking the time to complete our survey, and for helping us prepare our students for life after Millis High School!
Freshman Seminars Resume in January
During the week of September 26th, the school counselors met with the freshman class of 2020 in history classes. Through those seminars, they discussed a variety of topics, including: school rules and resources, extracurricular involvement, and thoughts on the transition to high school. They were also introduced to and logged in to the Naviance Family Connection, a website we use for career and college planning with the students throughout high school. The counselors have started meeting with the freshmen in the second of three planned seminars this year. Among the topics being discussed are building a transcript and what an actual MHS transcript looks like as well as creating a four-year academic plan.
Junior Seminars Begin in Early February
As we are wrapping up college applications and future plans for the Class of 2017, we are preparing to help the Class of 2018 begin their journey toward graduation in June of next year. With that in mind, the school counselors will be heading into junior English classes at the beginning of February to start discuss the college search and application process, other options such as gap years, military service, and entering the workforce, and more. We will again log in to the Naviance Family Connection to show students tools they can use in beginning the college search. The Naviance Family Connection contains great data to help the students see how their GPAs and standardized test scores match up with colleges they may be interested in, provides a wealth of information on careers and majors, and is updated to reflect admissions decisions of MHS graduates over the past four years. February vacation is a great time to start making college visits, and we hope the information we provide during our seminars will help explain how to get the most out of those visits as well as get the ball rolling on plans for life after MHS.
Sophomore Seminars Coming in Late February
Sophomore seminars are on the horizon. The school counselors will be going into sophomore English classrooms in late February to start talking about career readiness, the job market, and post-secondary college and career planning. Students will be logged back into their Naviance Family Connection accounts, where they will complete profiles based on the Myers-Briggs Personality Type Instrument, as well as other assessments related to career options and interests. Counselors will also be discussing online profiles with the students and the implications of their digital footprint on future employment and college applications.
College Mini-Fair is March 16
In conjunction with Medway High School, we will be hosting our annual College Mini-Fair for juniors on the morning of March 16. Representatives from 30-40 different schools will be available for juniors to meet with and answer questions about their institutions and programs. This is a great way for our students to learn about different types of schools and also meet with representatives that someday may be reading their college applications. We encourage our kids to dress for success that day and come prepared to make a positive impression on the admissions staff visiting our great school!
PSAT
This past October, a number of our juniors and sophomores sat for the the PSAT’s. In mid-December the counselors met with all students who took the test to hand out results and go over any questions. If your son/daughter has not received their results, they should stop by the School Counseling Office. Students were given back their test booklets along with paper score reports from the exam, and some handouts explaining how to review the test results and access them online. Students are able to access the results online as well, by creating a free account at studentscores.collegeboard.org. If they provided an email address on the exam, they should use the same one in creating their accounts and the scores should be right there for them when they log in. If they did not provide an email address, they should still register for an account but will need to use the access code listed on their paper score report to view their scores online.
The new online score system gives the student a host of great resources to help them decipher what their scores mean, tells them how they can improve their scores as they head toward taking the SAT this spring (for juniors), connects to Khan Academy, a free test prep resource now available to all students, and provides free college and career search engines that will be valuable as students begin the college search process. If you have any questions about the scores or about how to access them, please feel free to contact the School Counseling Office at 508-376-7023. There is also a great video done on YouTube by a local school counselor that explains the entire online score reporting portal and how to navigate the system, that can be found here: https://youtu.be/KNQGjsOQGpU
College Representative Visits
This past fall we were host to nearly 50 visiting colleges and universities. These college visits were held during both of the high school lunches. Student turnout was very good and it’s a great way for them to meet with the college representatives that may very well be reading their applications.
Senior Seminars
The School Counselors met with all the seniors during the week of September 15, going into English classes to go over post-secondary/college planning with the Class of 2017. They discussed resources and procedures around college applications and post-secondary planning, and helped the students set-up their Common Application accounts if they hadn’t already done that. The counselors met two times with each senior English class and helped them navigate through the college planning process. Since that time, students have been making individual appointments with their counselors to assist in the process, and those meetings will continue into the new year for students still figuring out plans for after graduation from Millis High School. We encourage students to please stop down to let us know of their admissions decisions as they find out in the coming weeks and months. We are eager to find out what they are hearing and know at the end of the day, they will find a great fit whether it be at a four-year or two-year college, a job, gap year program, technical/trade school, military commitment, or another worthwhile post-graduation endeavor.
Upcoming Important Dates
February 2: Junior Parent College Planning Night Program - 6:30 p.m. in the MHS auditorium
February 10: Regular registration deadline for March 11 SAT Reasoning Test ONLY. / NOTE: test not offered at MHS
February 11: ACT Test / NOTE: test not offered at MHS
March: Course selection for 2017-2018 for all students in grades 9-11
March 3: Regular registration deadline for April 8 ACT Test / NOTE: test not offered at MHS
March 8: Small School, Big Future Conference at MHS
March 11: SAT Reasoning Test ONLY / NOTE: test not offered at MHS
March 18: Annual Mini-College Fair at MHS
March 22: TEC College Fair at Westwood High School 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
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