Ms. Chamberlin is passionate about helping students. Throughout her experience as a guidance counselor, Ms. Chamberlin has learned a lot about the college process. She has also become skilled in ensuring her students have a great future with whatever they choose to do. In this interview, Ms. Chamberlin explains how she became a guidance counselor, how she helps students and ways that students can optimize their high school experience.

AC:  How long have you been a guidance counselor?

Ms. Chamberlin: This is actually my 20th year. My first year, I was at the middle school, Garfield for one year. Positions opened up at the high school so I’ve been here since 2004.

AC: What made you want to become a guidance counselor? Was this something you’ve always wanted to do?  

Ms. Chamberlin: No, I wanted to be a sportscaster but in order to do that you have to intern at a radio or tv station unpaid for a long time and after college I couldn’t afford to take an unpaid internship so I ended up going into advertising for 4 years, but I realized I didn’t want to travel a lot for business. My sister was a teacher so she kept encouraging me to go into education and that’s what made me change.

AC: Everyone has a guidance counselor but I feel like they don’t know what exactly they can help them with, so how can you help students?

Ms. Chamberlin:  For younger kids it’s more us just checking up on grades and attendance and making sure they’re meeting the graduation requirements. As kids get to be juniors and seniors we do more work around college and career planning, the types of options they have after high school.

AC: Since you are a guidance counselor people see you as a leader. Have you always been a leader or was that something you became overtime?

Ms. Chamberlin: I don’t see myself that way but I think other people see me that way and I think even as a kid I was kind of like that. I remember in middle school I was asked to be a peer leader, I think it’s because I get along with people. I also played sports and I was usually a leader on the team’s cause I would try to build a fun atmosphere.

AC: What’s some advice you have for freshmen starting this first year of high school?

Ms. Chamberlin: I wish that they would recognize that it’s a very difficult transition for them because in the younger grades even if you don’t pass you still get moved on, whereas in high school now you have to earn credits and pass certain classes to meet the graduation requirements, that part I think they don’t always get. I think if the kids were in class more then more kids would pass classes, it’s the kids that struggle that aren’t for the most part there to get the support that they need.

AC: What’s some advice you have for seniors starting their last year of high school?

Ms. Chamberlin: It’s tough for the seniors because half of their high school years they’ve been in a pandemic, so they haven’t had a full four years of what high school is really like and part of me thinks they need to enjoy all the events and things that come along but what they need to be focusing on at the first part of the year is making sure they have met all the graduation requirements.