Counseling department outlines new scheduling tools, four‑year planner and Google Classroom rollout

Kathy, a member of the district counseling department, told the Regional School District 09 board the department has rolled out new digital tools and will increase family communication to streamline scheduling and postsecondary planning.

"We transitioned from Naviance to SCORe," Kathy said, describing the new interface as more user friendly for recommendation writing and counselor workflows. She outlined a new four‑year planner, a digital credit tracker and an assigned Google Classroom workflow that will allow eighth‑grade students and families to prepare schedule requests before counselor meetings.

Kathy said the department will offer a January evening college program to provide general guidance to sophomores and juniors and that counselors will keep scheduled time slots for one‑on‑one selection meetings to reduce students waiting without a set appointment. She emphasized supports for students with IEPs and 504 plans, including individualized transition meetings, summer tours and planned check‑ins in the first weeks of ninth grade.

Administrators said curriculum rewrites and textbook updates (including a replacement for the AP Physics 1 text) will be funded through the coming budget cycle. Board members asked about counselor caseloads, parent access to the Google Classroom materials and how the district will measure engagement; staff said some enrollment and engagement metrics will be refined as the systems are implemented.

The counseling department asked the board to consider clearer expectations for counselor touch points and proposed using advisory periods and Google Classroom to ensure consistent messaging to students and families.