Every day, students rush to find a class to attend for FIT after first period is over. The 22 minutes sessions for students provide a time to meet with teachers and get additional help or complete assignments. This school year the counselors are introducing a guidance FIT plan with seven different topics about social emotional learning.

The seven sessions are: Finding Your Inner Strength, I’m So Stressed I Could Scream, Three…Two…One…Happy New Year, Lean On Me: How to be a Good Friend, Are They Really That Into You, Finding Your Zen, and Express Yourself. Each session provides a different opportunity to explore and get advice from counselors about important aspects in a teen’s life.

“As school counselors, we understand that it’s not easy to be a teenager in 2017, and that there are many factors affecting teens’ ability to thrive,” counselor Katherine Owen said. “We wanted to provide in-house opportunities for students to reflect on their social-emotional health and well-being through a variety of workshops that address typical topics that teens struggle with.”

Each session will be led by a different counselor with the goal that students will leave with beneficial tools to help them conquer the challenges they are struggling with.

“We want students to see the outreach opportunity as a way of getting to know their counselor in a smaller setting, so that they can feel more comfortable coming to us when needed,” Owen said. “Finally, it’s our hope that students will come to understand and appreciate the importance of social-emotional learning through exposure to various SEL topics and opportunities.”

One concern about the sessions is student response and interest level.

“The FIT session about stress intrigues me the most because it is an issue most, if not all, high schoolers deal with,” senior Blake Moyer said. “Going over ways to manage, reduce, and solve stress with school is very helpful. Even providing insight on solutions to stress not related to school is beneficial.”

However, some students find that it’s unlikely they will attend the FIT sessions, and many of them believe they could be using fit sessions for other, more valuable purposes.

“I don’t see myself attending because I’d rather use FIT to do homework, get help, or catch up with friends,  but I would feel comfortable going,” senior Hana Dole said.

The sessions are bringing about a change to the Bowie campus between the relationship of a high school counselor and student. For many, this can be seen as a positive change throughout the school.

“Faculty here cares about our health and our well being. This is a way to bridge the forced rules that they are mandated to follow and the complexities of student’s lives,” Moyer said.