Mission Statement Critique Paper

Mission Statement Critique

Daniella Salemo

Montclair State University

Abstract

George Washington Middle School Wayne, NJ.:

George Washington Middle School meets state and national standards and is dedicated to promoting and enhancing the academic, personal, social/emotional and career development of all students through individual, group and school based family counseling. In addition, the counselors implement character education through a holistic approach that integrates character development into every aspect of school (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.). 

The counselors continue to focus on the six pillars of character selected by the student body. The pillars of character are honesty, pride, respect, acceptance, integrity and responsibility. The counselors utilize every opportunity to engage the students in thinking about their character and values and reflect on the moral implications of what they do and how they influence the world around them (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.). 

Moreover, the counselors work collaboratively with teaching staff, administration, the school nurse, and support staff within the school and oversee the Intervention and Referral Services (I&RS) and Section 504 Committees (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.). 

Mission Statement Critique

            The mission statement I will be critiquing is from the George Washington Middle School’s, school counseling department in Wayne, NJ.  Prior to deciding to critique this mission statement, I looked through many different middle school counseling websites around the area and stopped here because I was pleasantly surprised to see that their department is not guidance, but rather school counseling.  I am currently in a high school setting for my practicum class, but anticipate working in a middle school next year and wanted to learn more about middle school counseling programs.  Most of my work experience has been with high school students either as a coach, teaching assistant, substitute teacher, or intern, so I am looking forward to getting the most variety of experiences as I can.  I also have to say that this was the best mission statement I came across, and the best out of the three middle schools that the Wayne public school system offers as well.  It is also the only school, that I came across, that has a separate website for their counseling department with different resources and links.

            The ASCA national model focuses on five main objectives that a mission statement should cover (ASCA national Model 2012).  These objectives are, making sure to mention the incorporation of stakeholders, advocating for students, catering the counseling program to diversity, incorporating all three domains of school counselors equally into their programs (personal/social, career, and academic development), and working towards future goals for students (ASCA national Model 2012).  Out of the few mission statements I read, I feel that the George Washington Middle School’s mission statement was more on target with these objectives than others.  The George Washington School Counselors specifically state that they promote and enhance the three domains, that they work collaboratively with stakeholders, and incorporate some sort of accommodations for diverse students by supporting I&RS and section 504 committees (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.), which are important topics not only to mention in a mission statement, but to implement in a comprehensive school counseling program.

Even though this mission statement does not state specific goals, their decision to focus the program towards character building and incorporating the character building into, “every aspect of school,” shows that they have a clear plan for the future (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.).  Taking it a step further, they have clearly implemented character development into the school setting by working to develop the six pillars of character development selected by student body (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.).  This shows that they have done some sort of activity or school wide lesson about character development and have incorporated it into their program.  It also shows that their curriculum is non prescriptive and is tailored to the school's needs (Dollarhide & Saginak 2012).

One of the most important parts of a comprehensive school counseling program, and is also important to mention in a mission statement, is advocacy.  Advocacy can be interpreted in so many different ways that advocacy ends up involving everything school counselors do (Myers, Sweeny, & White 2002).  According to the ASCA National Model, advocacy involves leadership, collaboration, and systemic change (Trusty & Brown 2005).  Some of these tasks include creating opportunities to learn for all students, ensuring access to a quality school curriculum, and collaborating with others within and outside the school to help students meet their needs (Trusty & Brown 2005). So does this mission statement address advocacy? Yes.  George Washington Middle School talks about character development in all aspects of school, development through individual, groups and family based counseling, the counselors engaging students in thinking about character values, reflecting on their moral values and how it influences the world, and how they work with stakeholders (Molina, Santangelo, & Schlachter n.d.).  All of these aspects show how they incorporate advocacy into their program.

 As I mentioned above, the George Washington Middle School’s counseling program mission statement puts a strong emphasis on character building and development.  While this is a positive aspect of the mission statement, it also shows that they are not equally distributing their program to each of the domains.  With middle school aged children, academic, and especially career development, should play a role that is just as important as social and emotional development.  In chapter 14 of Legal and Ethical Issues of school counselors by Stone and Dahir, they mention how important it is to start student’s career building in even elementary school.  I thought a great example they used was how students in NY pick their high schools based on their interests (Stone & Dahir 2015), because by giving students more tools for career awareness at a younger age it helps to develop their academic success as students will be more inclined to work towards a better future after high school.

Another important aspect of a School Counseling Mission Statement is that it aligns with that of the school districts (ASCA National Model 2012).  The Wayne public school district does not have a specific mission statement (at least not one that I could find), but in their district overview, they have a brief description that gives an overview of goals for each school within the district.  The overview for the middle schools talks about the importance of intellectual, social and emotional needs of the students (Wayne Township Public School District: District Overview n.d.), along with the importance of academics.  The school counseling mission statement aligns with the district overview by addressing the intellectual, and social and emotional needs of their students, but not academics.  The overview states that they provide a traditional high school approach in eighth grade where, students who are qualified, take high school courses in math, science or foreign language (Wayne Township Public School District: District Overview n.d.). As I mentioned above, there is not enough emphasis on career and academic development in this mission statement, especially since the district talks about the high school program it offers for eighth graders in the overview. The school counseling mission statement should address how it assists in the academic development, especially those of students who will take advanced courses that will push them ahead of their classmates. 

The district overview also addresses a “strong home-to-school connection,” that “provides additional support for students at this critical age (Wayne Township Public School District: District Overview n.d.).”  Although it does not say how they connect them, this would be a good opportunity for the counseling program to show it is involved in the academic success of students.  Instead, it does not mention how they address or align with this incentive of district.

Overall, this is an exceptional mission statement.  It is clearly focused towards the needs of the school and students, the length is appropriate, it gives students and stakeholders a description of exactly how it functions, and has clear a system in place.  Some suggestions for improvement would be to aligning the mission statement more with the districts overview, emphasize academic and career development equivalent to the emphasis of character development, and broadening their program’s range to accommodate more diversity.  They might also want to reconsider the language of the mission statement as their population is middle school students and the language might be confusing for students to understand.  But if the statement is focused towards parents (which it seems to be), it is appropriate.  As for mission statements go, this one passes my test.

References

ASCA national model: a framework for school counseling programs. (2012). Alexandria VA:

American School Counselor Association.

Dollarhide C.T., Saginak K.A.(2012).  Models of Delivery Systems.  Comprehensive School

Counseling Program:  K-12 Delivery Systems in Action 2^nd Edition. (pp.86-106). Pearson

Education 2003

Molina, J., Santangelo, D., & Schlachter, D. (n.d.). George Washington Middle School.

Retrieved October 23, 2017, from https://sites.google.com/wayneschools.com/gwcounselingdept/home

Myers, J. E, Sweeney, T. J., & White, V. E. (2002). Advocacy for counselors: A

professional imperative. Journal of Counseling & Development, 80(4), 394-402.

Stone C.B., Dahir C.A., (2015). All Students College and Career Ready.  The Transformed

School Counselor 3rd Edition (pp. 441-477).  Boston Massachusetts: Cengage Learning.

Stone C.B., Dahir C.A., (2015). Implementing the ASCA National Model.  The Transformed

School Counselor 3rd Edition (pp. 183-221) Boston Massachusetts: Cengage Learning.

Trusty J., Brown D. (2005) Advocacy Competencies for Professional School Counselors.

Professional School Counseling. 8(3):259-265

Wayne Township Public School District: District Overview (n.d.). Retrieved October 23, 2017,

from

http://wayne.schoolfusion.us/modules/cms/pages.phtml?pageid=269742&sessionid=bec3

515504fb8a67a77b0d606e84d011