Gratitude

We had an incident in the Counselling Department the other day.  A older gentleman was seen walking through the area without first going through the usual check in procedure at the front office.  In our security conscious school system, this is a cause for concern.  Our Department Head quickly made contact with the gentleman and as far as I knew the person had left the school.  Wrong.  On my way through the office later on, he appeared before me, seemingly anxious to talk to me.  I was a little concerned as his English was not fluent and I was not sure why  he would want to speak to me.   It turns out that his son and daughter had both been students of mine in years gone by.  His son had some difficulties with his credits as he had come to our school from the U.S.A.  I had worked with him to clear things up, gather all his credits and put him on a path toward earning a British Columbia Dogwood  high school diploma.  This had led to the son being eventually accepted into a prestigious university in Ontario.  He had also earned several scholarships.  The gentleman's daughter had done equally well.  The purpose of the impromptu visit to our Counselling office by the older gentleman was to express his gratitude to those of us on the counselling staff who had put in the time and effort to help his son and daughter at a time when their academic credentials were in need of clarification.  To us, it was all in a day's work.  To him and his family it meant everything and he simply had to come to see us personally to express his gratitude.  We ended our conversation by shaking hands.  He offered a deep bow to show his  respect as is the custom in Asia.  I offered my own somewhat awkward bow in return and with that we went our separate ways, both feeling a sense of accomplishment and gratitude.

Butterflies ...

No doubt most of our 1500 students are feeling a little nervous as thoughts turn away from summer activities and back to academic requirements and demands.  Counsellors are not immune to this nervous anticipation and are also feeling that familiar feeling in the pit of the stomach as we re-focus on the needs and wishes of our students.  Sometimes the biggest challenge right off the bat is remembering the bewildering array of passwords and computer commands that were so familiar just two months ago.  One more week before returning to work; another year is set to begin   After 29 years it still holds the same mixture of excitement and anticipation.