In the pursuit of academic excellence where we understand that success on the SAT or ACT can open doors for students and clearly demonstrate readiness for college-level work, schools must build a strategy for how to leverage their counseling staff. Schools that constantly seek innovative strategies that utilize the unique skill set of their counseling staff will prepare more students for a broader range of successful outcomes. 

Counseling plays a vital role in guiding students toward their goals, but sadly, resources are limited; the national student-to-counselor ratio is roughly 385:1 and as high as 645:1 in Arizona. Students need more guidance than ever regarding their postsecondary options, and unfortunately, the challenges facing schools to deliver these supports are mounting. This means schools must be tactical in how they spend time and apply their energy. A data-driven approach to counseling is a game-changer in this context, enabling schools to effectively prepare students for standardized tests like the ACT and SAT and group them for interventions and support based on the data. By leveraging data, schools can move away from the traditional “big push” in the junior year and adopt a more personalized and targeted approach across an extended time frame.

We present four strategies to help expand the impact of the counseling staff at your campus. Analyzing student performance against specific benchmarks that lead to achieving a larger goal is at the heart of data-driven counseling. This involves connecting with students earlier to build a college-going-culture, monitoring multiple metrics, directly coaching your team, and making the data you care about public.

Connect Students and Counselors Early and Often

One of the key strategies in data-driven counseling is early intervention. Counselors should run college readiness sessions early for students. It can be powerful for the counseling staff to facilitate a college-related session during freshman orientation to demonstrate your campus’s commitment to college readiness on day one of their entry to the community. 10th grade students often benefit from a counselor particularly around choosing courses. These are moments where counselors can build rapport with students, invest them in the college process, and set personal growth targets for the ACT and SAT in a way that can motivate and inspire students. College counselors for many students appear and are the closest proxy for a college admissions officer so it can be influential for them to reinforce the importance and value of these exams for students.

Apply a Multi-Indicator Approach

Counselors have a lot of data to collect, think about, and manage. Knowing what your counselors are tracking and why is essential for school leaders. They must also have a multi-indicator approach that includes ACT and SAT scores. There are several ways for students to indicate academic readiness for college. Still, it’s essential that the counselors align with the school’s vision for this and actively monitor and support the efforts to ensure students are opening as many doors as possible. ACT and SAT scores alone are not all that matters; breaking this down to include practice tests and PSAT results, as well as state exams or content assessments related to the ACT and SAT can help inform strategies and interventions. By analyzing these indicators, counselors can identify patterns and trends that may not be immediately apparent, allowing them to develop more effective support strategies. For instance, a student struggling with math may require additional support, such as tutoring or online resources, to help them catch up with their peers.

Develop Your College Counseling Staff

You may not see yourself as the best person to coach the counseling team, but finding ways to coach, mentor, and develop them individually or as a group, even in small doses, can have a powerful effect. They will hear from you about the school’s vision, how the ACT and SAT initiatives support that, and, more importantly, the role they can play. This is also an opportunity to learn more about their work. This development does not need to be complex or arduous to plan. In fact, it can be simple and effective when you pick the right topic and structure.

Collaborative Data Reflection Example

Topic	Review October PSAT Results
Opening	State the purpose of the meeting, share the data, and present three reflection questions. Think Time: Allow everyone to review the data and answer the questions independently.
Group Charting	Break the participants up into groups and have them discuss and write their answers on chart paper.
Gallery Walk	Participants walk around the room, noting ideas they agree with by writing a check mark next to them and writing a question to the authoring group at the bottom of the chart.
Debrief	Groups return to their chart paper and debrief what they observed around the room and the questions from their chart paper.
Whole Group Debrief	Each group shares 1-2 takeaways, and then an open discussion follows.
Action Steps	The leader facilitates the final step of asking the group, “What actions need to happen for us to best respond to this data?” These should have an owner and deadlines. Larger complex items should be broken down into smaller discrete tasks.

Progress Monitor Publicly

What you monitor and ask about as a school leader is what people see you caring about. Suppose you are actively monitoring and checking in with your counseling staff about the interventions coming out of the Collaborative Data Reflection meeting or the latest practice test results. These actions demonstrate your priorities as a school leader. Find ways to make it public how you are monitoring student progress towards your ACT and SAT priorities. This could be a tracker in your office, a section in your weekly newsletter to staff, a bulletin board in the hallway, a slide during homeroom announcements each week. 

This involves regularly tracking student progress alongside counselors, providing feedback, and following up to ensure that adjustments to learning plans are promptly implemented. By doing so, you can ensure counselors positively impact student outcomes. Regular and transparent progress monitoring also helps to build a positive sense of accountability, encouraging students to take ownership of their learning and strive for excellence.

In conclusion, a data-driven approach to counseling is a powerful strategy for transforming schools into centers of academic excellence. Creating a data-driven culture within a counseling team levels up the impact of all the other efforts to support SAT and ACT growth and achievement. By adopting strategies such as early connections, multi-indicator approaches, counseling staff development, and public progress monitoring, schools can create a supportive and inclusive learning environment that sets students up for success and operates with data at the heart of decision making.

Reflection Questions for School Leaders: 

• What are your counseling team’s strengths and weaknesses in terms of building a college-bound culture?
• How do you build a college-going culture in 9th and 10th grade already? How can you leverage your counseling staff to increase student investment in the college process and preparing for the ACT and SAT?
• What metrics will you measure and monitor that will help you track student progress toward ACT/SAT readiness and college readiness overall?
• How will you make progress toward your ACT and SAT goals visible to your counseling team and students?

Building a positive school-wide culture around ACT and SAT assessments is challenging and essential. This blog is part of a series, “10 Strategies for Building a Culture of ACT and SAT Success,” where we’ve outlined strategies to help school leaders. If you have questions or need support as you build a school-wide culture, please reach out to Thomas O’Brien at thomas@winwardacademy.com.

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About Winward Academy – Winward Academy is one of the world’s leading innovators in the online education space, providing web-based academic support that enhances students’ knowledge, confidence, and competitiveness in middle and high school academics and in college applications. We help thousands of students every year by providing personalized, comprehensive ACT and SAT test preparation and extensive math curriculum support. The Winward Academy learning platform honors over 40 years of education and cognitive psychology research, incorporating proven techniques that promote effective learning.

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