Over the years, many students have confided in me, trusted me, and worked with me to build their post-secondary pathways. I value those relationships deeply and remain grateful to have been part of their journeys. Most of the time, the system allows students to find a path that fits. Sometimes, however, it does not and those moments reveal where policies fall short of real students’ lives.
I recall a student who, in Grade 9, recognized that university was not his goal. Together, with his parents and the Special Education team, we developed a clear plan toward the skilled trades. His courses and cooperative education experiences were carefully mapped out, and he left my office confident in his direction. I continued to meet with the student and his parents twice a year to hand-timetable and ensure he would be able to follow his pathway plan. However, by the end of his Grade 11 year, as often happens, his goals evolved. Pathway planning is fluid or at least it should be. Yet when he tried to pivot, he no longer had the required courses to support a new plan. Despite exploring summer school, night school, and dual-credit options, board- and college-level policies left no flexibility to make the transition work.
I have seen similar issues with the standardized Grade 10 literacy test, a graduation requirement for all Ontario students regardless of reading comprehension level or English-language proficiency. Students who are unsuccessful, sometimes more than once, are placed in a literacy course, which some also fail. For these students, the requirement becomes a barrier rather than a support. I have countless other examples like these.
When policymakers make broad, one-size-fits-all decisions that directly affect students but leave guidance counsellors to explain and justify policies we did not design, it places us in an impossible position. We are caught between institutional rules and the very students we are meant to advocate for.
Educational policies are designed for systems, while counsellors work with and for individual students and families. Policy frameworks rely on predictability and standardization; students rarely do. Each student (and by extension, their family) starts high school with a distinct lived experience, shaped by academic history, personal circumstances, timing, and a host of mitigating factors, personal to that student. As a result, the “standard pathway” is often more theoretical than the real lived experience.
Guidance counsellors first receive policies as shared documents which are clearly written (sometimes) and carefully structured by governing bodies, school boards, and post-secondary institutions. We encounter them again at the point of implementation, where those same policies must be explained to the school community and applied to a student’s educational journey. At the grassroots level, guidance work often feels like translating system logic into human terms. When policies meet complexity, the fit is not always clean or concise. The work of implementing them can lead to emotionally charged moments, not because the policies are necessarily flawed, but because student lives are rarely linear.
As a veteran guidance counsellor, sometimes I feel that policymakers underestimate how guidance really works. Guidance work depends on relationship building. Trust is built slowly but when we are directed to implement a policy without much notice or ability to work out a timeline that benefits the school and students, a chasm is created. Students need time to process identity, failure, and redirection. Provincial educational, school board and post-secondary institution policies don’t just alter requirements – they reshape how a student sees their future.
Sometimes a policy might seem clear and well structured in theory. Data is collected and reviewed, teams are assembled and policies are put into place. However, what appears neutral at a policy level can at times become exclusionary in practice. When policies are put into place and the school board and school implements the policy, the guidance counsellor becomes the messenger of limits and structure that we did not set. Some policies fit some communities more than others. A one size or policy fits all is rarely true. Guidance counsellors must balance compliance with compassion. At times, and I speak from personal experience, I feel a quiet moral stress knowing that flexibility in specific and unique situations would help but may not always be allowed. Imagine if guidance counsellors were invited to give their input and help establish these policies. We are front line workers and at a minimum, should have a voice.
When I am in conversations with fellow department heads and guidance counsellor colleagues, we wish that governing bodies would ask counsellors questions that would deepen understanding, such as:
- Who benefits most from this? Who are we leaving behind?
- What happens to a student who needs to change direction?
- Is there any flexibility built into the policy for students who need it?
As guidance counsellors, we understand that educational policies have their place and that their intention may be to inspire positive change and results. It’s the impact that I find myself reflecting on. There needs to be a better collaboration between the province, the school boards, and the guidance counsellors who are at the school level. Together, we need to take a hard look at current policies and procedures, understand the needs of students today and tomorrow, and adjust those policies to allow the flexibility to meet students’ needs so students and guidance counsellors don’t feel shackled by the policies. Guidance counsellors’ ultimate job when it comes to instituting policies at the school level is to translate those policies into human terms, so students and their families have a full understanding of the policies with the ultimate goal of helping guide students with their educational and post-secondary goals. For my grade 9 student who felt limited in grade 11 when he changed his pathway; for my ESL student who had to take a literacy component multiple times to graduate high school, and for all those other student cases where the policy did not fit the learner, we need to do better.
By: Anna Macri
