CENTURY HIGH SCHOOL 2525 VioLa Roap NE ROCHESTER, MINNESOTA 55906 507-328-5100 + (FAX) 507-328-5045, May 19, 2017 To Whom it May Concern, This letter is written on behalf of Amanda Andrews, whom | am currently supervising as a school counseling intern at Century High School. Amanda is participating in a 20 week part-time internship with me. She has been rotating her days between Century and a local middle school. Prior to mid-completion of Amanda's hours, she was able to attend to nearly all of the daily duties of a high school counselor, including adopting my 380 student caseload. She has spent a great deal of her time: monitoring students’ weekly academic status, following up on teacher/administrator/guardian concerns, as well as being the primary in assisting anyone who showed up at my office door or in my email, Amanda has helped students learn study strategies, time management, emotional coping skills, and communication skills, to name a few. She has learned resources for assisting students in developing plans for after high school. When working with a student, she utilizes a person-centered and solution-focused model. Amanda’s response to students is calm, efficient, and effective. She has experienced a couple of severe student crisis situations which have involved social services, our police liaison, school nurse, and administrative team. In these crises, she has acted quickly to ensure the student's safety, involved the necessary other support people, and communicated very professionally with the guardians. Amanda demonstrates comfort and confidence when in a team or large-group setting. She has assisted the counseling staff in delivering professional development training in the area of mental health for our building staff as well as has delivered classroom guidance lessons. Several teachers have approached me to compliment Amanda on her communication presence. She has developed a sense of comfort in participating and leading meetings involving our building administrative or teacher teams or meetings with parents, so much that she attends and facilitates these meetings without me, ‘Amanda is currently co-facilitating a grief and loss support group within our school, with the Bereavement Coordinator for Season's Hospice. Amanda ensures all curriculum needs are prepared ahead of time and that the space used for group is reserved and clean. Within the group, Amanda actively participates and offers insight due to her own loss. The students appear to trust her and appreciate her input. She is warm, caring, and willing to engage them in more than @ surface conversation, She has built rapport and that adds to the group's strength. She is eager to debrief after a group and makes sure she has extra handouts for students who were not able to be there. ‘Amanda has proven herself to be highly skilled in communication and counseling techniques, flexible, calm, and caring. She demonstrates habits of time management, ease with technology, organization, and an ability to juggle and prioritize ‘the multitude of varied daily tasks. | am confident in Amanda's future success as a school counselor and truly wish we could keep her on staff. Please feel free to contact me with any questions regarding her application. She will be a great addition to any academic setting. Sincerely, Zz dation ALEC ‘Austinson EdD, LSC ‘School Counselor quel Opportunity Employer