Student Counsel
Chaplains, confessions, schools & Switzerland.
I don’t know if you ever went to your school counselor’s office but the tales of an omnipresent “Hang in There!” tabby cat poster is an urban myth. Most of the posters are of other countries that a counselor will never be able to afford, such as Switzerland. (I don’t know why. It’s just always Switzerland.)
But now public school boards in Texas will be able to replace these counselors with chaplains. As in, chaplains. That’s not counseling; that’s confession. I went to Catholic school and we had to go to confession on a regular basis. There were two doors to see the priest. The “screen” on one side, and face-to-face on the other. One time I went in the wrong door and he was just sitting there. I ran out of the room and immediately switched to the screen side, disguising my voice with a cockney accent so he would think I was that exchange student.
I don’t have anything against chaplains, aside from them being the poor man’s deacon, but what are they doing in public schools? And how are they qualified? Most school counselors have master’s degrees and if I had known that, I would totally have been a school counselor. I would have my master’s degree framed on the wall to remind my students that they will never attain the same higher education level because they are losers. (And yes, it will hang next to my Switzerland poster.)
The bill was sponsored by Republican Rep. Cole Hefner of Mount Pleasant. He’s the father of seven children. (Seven Brides? Seven Brothers? Who knows!) I’ve never heard of Mount Pleasant so I’ll dismiss it along with most other cities outside of Austin by vaguely saying it’s out there, somewhere. But in all fairness, SB 763 allows school boards to choose whether or not to use the chaplains. Have you seen the school boards lately? They’re like brainwashed cult followers wearing Ann Taylor sweater sets and too much MAC satin lipstick.
Since I grew up with priests and a lifesize picture of Pope John Paul II in our carpeted-stairs hallway, I’m not that familiar with what a chaplain does. So I googled, what does a chaplain do all day, and it said, nothing. I mean, I can’t blame them for wanting to get out of their windowless rooms in the monastery and into the daylight.
So if you see chaplains wandering around your school this fall, don’t be alarmed. Think of them as just your average counselor except they were specially chosen by God. As opposed to the middle-aged woman who can’t get her shit together. Hang in there.