Kimberly Handel: The new College and Career counselor
Kimberly Handel in the College and Career Center of the library (The Puma Prensa / Sloane Crocker)
By Sloane Crocker, co-executive editor
The first few weeks of the school year were certainly a little chaotic for everyone returning to campus, but it was on a whole other level for Kimberly Handel, Maria Carrillo High School’s current college and career counselor. Handel, who most students know as the veteran college and career counselor, was switched to fill the position of a regular Carrillo counselor over the summer, only to bounce back to her previous position at the start of the school year.
The explanation for this change in her job title is due to the district budget cuts. The district found it necessary to have part-time college and career counselors rather than employ one counselor per school, as had previously been the case. This part time position means that this year, these counselors will spend their time split between two campuses, with MCHS being paired with Ridgeway High School. Thus Handel, who had established herself as MCHS’s college and career counselor for four years, was moved to the position of a regular counselor. She explained that the district decided who would fill the part-time college and career positions based on seniority; the district gave the full time positions at single schools to the counselors with more experience, while the counselors without enough seniority to guarantee a position in the new school year were part of the pool from which the new college and career counselors were chosen.
Of course, Handel was not away from her old job for too long. Over the summer, the counselor who was slated to fill the Carrillo-Ridgeway college and career counselor position decided not to take the job, which meant that this slot opened up again. Handel found out about this opening and interviewed for the position the week before school started. She was then notified that she got the job and would be switching back to her previous position this school year.
When asked whether or not this uncertainty regarding her role for the year was stressful, she replied in the affirmative, stating that she “would’ve been doing a lot more preparation for the College and Career Center” over the summer if she had known ahead of time. She also said that she has been unable to do the start-of-year planning that she usually does. In all she felt that it was “hard not knowing what [she] was going to be doing.”
This doesn’t mean, however, that Handel disliked her time spent as a regular school counselor. Rather, she “really enjoyed” this new job position, as she found that she “got to know students so much better.” She feels that spending time in the College and Career Center, also known as the CCC, can sometimes be a bit lonely, which is a contrast with the high caseload of regular counselors that allowed Handel to “see students a lot more frequently.” Overall, though she only spent a short time as a regular counselor, she found that she “learned a lot” and can now better relate to what the other counselors are tasked with.
However, working as a college and career counselor has always been Handel’s true calling, even before she came to Carrillo. In graduate school she had a secondary emphasis on career counseling, and the first school she worked at had the motto “College for Certain,” meaning that she did a lot of work with students, including a large number of first generation students, in terms of college applications. She found that she loved this focus on college counseling, and when the opportunity first arose to manage the CCC here at Carrillo after the previous counselor left, she “knew that’s what [she] wanted to do.” And now, she wants to “stick with it,” even though she will be split between two schools, as it’s a “really important position" that she genuinely loves.
In terms of specific things that Handel is looking forward to this year, she named one in particular: mock interviews with the junior class. She stated that she loves how successful the sophomore networking event has been historically, and now wants to expand this to the junior class as well. The mock interviews would be “so useful” in providing students with experience in these real world situations. Handel also expressed some more general goals, one of which was that she wants to find a way to connect with more students. She’s thinking of meeting with first generation students interested in applying to four year colleges or otherwise targeting groups who might need more assistance. She said that she hopes to find a “balance between reaching a lot of students at once but also bringing in students who might not otherwise be seeking [her] out.” She also wants to spread the word more, as she said that optional workshops or advocacy presentations often only reach a small percentage of the student population. To address this, she hopes to work with teachers in terms of both informing them of college and career opportunities for students and also planning times for more frequent in-class presentations.
Handel may be determined to make the college and career center even better this year, but she’s already done so much for the school and deserves to be appreciated. She’s stayed positive and determined even in the face of uncertainty, and though she may now be spending some of her time at Ridgeway, she’s clearly a Puma for life. In her words: “I really love it here at Carrillo.”