Navigating Transitions
We are now in the full swing of the 2024-2025 school year. Equipped with backpacks, schedules, pens, pencils, possibly various electronics, and maybe some new fashion looks, these students also carry a certain amount of stress. Anything new holds the challenge of change and the promise of possibility. Academic institutions are no different and students aren’t the only ones who feel it.
As a former teacher, I remember the opening ritual of orientations held in August as the beginning of the mixture of excitement and fright that only grew in between the district-wide trainings and increasingly frantic classroom preparations until the first day of school.
“What if the kids don’t like me?”
“Why did I get assigned that new class?”
“How will I handle the new schedule?”
These and other questions would dominate my thoughts in the daytime and disturb my sleep at night. That is until, ready or not, the first day of school arrived with the arrival of students in the hallways and the clanging of the first bell of the school year. Suddenly, all the earlier stress and disquiet melted away in the motions and machinations of the day, and within the first few days if not hours, a new calm about the budding year appeared.
But this ease of transition isn’t the same for everyone. Whether due to changes in addresses, within the family, loss, shifts within friend groups, or academic challenges from the former year and within the new one, navigating transitions doesn’t always occur easily. Sometimes, students, parents, and families could use some extra support to realize academic, social and/or emotional hopes and goals.
Educators too.
Trained counselors and therapists can help with that.
At Leadlight Counseling, our expertise runs from working with infants through adulthood, as well as individuals, couples, and families as each situation requires. Transitions can be hard, but help is available for all the many transitions in life, including the new school year.
