ERIC Number: EJ1476655
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2025-Jun
Pages: 13
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1866-2625
EISSN: EISSN-1866-2633
Available Date: 2024-12-03
The Life of a School Mental Health Professional: A Daily Diary of School Counselor and Social Worker Tasks
Sarah Lindstrom Johnson1; Brooke Johnson1; Ana Maria Meléndez Guevara2; Marianne Fillhouer3
School Mental Health, v17 n2 p410-422 2025
In recent years, the focus on student safety and well-being has intensified within educational settings, driven by national crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic and school shootings and rates of student mental health decline. School mental health professionals (SMHPs) such as school counselors and school social workers are resources that schools can use as a protective factor against these threats to student well-being. However, role-based stressors preventing SMHPs from being appropriately integrated into the current educational environment such as high caseloads, financial insecurity, and a divisive political environment have accumulated in parallel to these events. Unfortunately there has been little systematic research on understanding factors to prevent stress, such as coworker support. Thus, this study delves into the daily tasks and stressors experienced by SMHPs, aiming to elucidate their roles, investigate patterns of daily activities linked to higher stress, and explore the moderating effects of perceived coworker support on SMHP stress levels. The study involved 36 school counselors and social workers funded under Arizona's School Safety Program who completed brief ecological momentary assessments (EMA) twice a week, reflecting on their experiences over the preceding days, for a duration of up to four weeks (n = 285 daily logs). Findings using latent class analysis reveal three distinct profiles of SMHP activities with high activity days associated with higher levels of stress. Additionally, coworker support was not significantly different between different profiles of days. Future research should include tasks outside the responsibilities of SMHPs, such as administrative tasks, to account for the growing body of research indicating these as additional SMHP stressors, as well as explore systemic factors that may contribute to these results.
Descriptors: School Health Services, Mental Health Programs, Mental Health Workers, School Counselors, Social Work, Caseworkers, Stress Variables, Counselor Role, School Safety
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research; Tests/Questionnaires
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Arizona
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: 1Arizona State University, Family and Human Development, Tempe, USA; 2Mathematica, Princeton, USA; 3Northern Arizona University, Educational Psychology, Phoenix, USA