Schools readvertise counselor job after remote applicant withdraws

The school district is readvertising for a full-time, in-person counselor to serve Wrangell’s 260 students starting in August.

Amid pushback from faculty and at least one board member at last month’s school board meeting, the previously selected out-of-town applicant withdrew her bid to work as a remote K-12 counselor for the coming school year.

The district administration last month proposed a contract for remote services with Lindsay Pinkelman, who runs Find a Way Consulting, based in Delta Junction, 95 miles southeast of Fairbanks.

Though the board had scheduled a public hearing on the contract for its June 3 meeting, the hearing was canceled when the applicant decided to withdraw.

Schools Superintendent Bill Burr confirmed on June 5 that Pinkelman was aware of the concerns raised at the previous meeting, which led to her decision to withdraw. “Local support is an important factor,” he said. “She needs to have a good relationship with the school and the staff. It was going to make it very difficult if the classroom support was not there.”

Meanwhile, the counselor job remains open, and Burr said there was already a new applicant as of June 3 while another had expressed interest. “It’s still posted, so we will look at other candidates.”

Julie Williams resigned as counselor at the end of the spring term after two years in the job.

Teachers Mikki Angerman, Heather Howe, Laura Davies and her husband Winston Davies all spoke at the May 20 school board meeting to express their concerns and objections to remote counseling services, citing various reasons, including the need for in-person counseling, lack of involvement from faculty and staff in the hiring process, as well as concern that the duties normally performed by an in-person counselor that would fall to other staff members.

School board member and clinical psychologist John DeRuyter, who had stated previously that he could not support virtual counseling, said after the June 3 board meeting: “In order to have effective counseling, you have to connect, and you can’t do that through video.”