Nope you didn't read the title incorrectly, this post is about ways to travel as a school counselor. This summer I had an opportunity to do an educator travel/study abroad program to England and Norway and it was awesome! I got a staff email about traveling abroad for the summer and the requirements were to be a teacher. I then emailed the contact person and asked if school counselors could come along and ironically the contact person replied "why we've never had a school counselor apply for this program" BINGO, that was my way in (remember we have to be our biggest advocate)! Here are some options on how to find out more about traveling abroad opportunities:
-Many colleges/universities have summer travel opportunities for teachers/educators/school counselors during the summer. You don't necessarily have to be a student at the university to go on the trip either. Check with your alma mater or colleges/universities in your area. My trip to England/Norway was through the university where I've supervised counselor interns.
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| 2014 England Educator Study Abroad Group at Highclere Castle (the Downtown Abbey House) |
-If you're working on the high school level, see if you can chaperone a study abroad trip with your foreign language department. For us on the elem and middle school levels, make friends with high school counselors to be in the loop about traveling with a school group.
-Have a counselor topic that you'd like to research from a global perspective and do you live in a rural area? Consider applying for a Global Teacher Fellowship (I'm not able to apply for this because where I live doesn't qualify as a rural area)
Most programs have end of year or early spring deadlines (just double check the dates for the trip you're interested in).
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| Hiking along The White Cliffs of Dover (Dover, England) |
I've always enjoyed any opportunity to travel and I must say that going this route is great, I just wish that I had known about opportunities like this earlier in my career. Better late than never! I'll say the travel abroad bug has bitten me and I'm already making plans to travel abroad for the upcoming summer (I'm thinking of visiting Central America this time around).