Professional Partner of the Month: July 2009
Teri Lerch
"Teri is so enthusiastic about what she does! She worked so well with her student group who attended the Leadership Institute in 2007, and it was apparent in their success and team dynamics. Teri was back at this year's Leadership Institute with a new team of Eastern York sophomores, and I have no doubt that under her guidance, their project will be as successful as that of their peers. As a Career Counselor, I'm sure Teri makes career exploration an enjoyable topic for her students, if not through subject matter, then through her genuine personality and positive outlook."
- Melissa Mogle Snyder, Program Director, The Second Mile
"One example that helps illustrates Teri's dedication is the fact that she and her family volunteer their time to the district to offer a summer career camp. This camp links high school students and elementary students together for five days in the summer, promoting career awareness. With our extended contract, Teri could easily get paid for this week, but she sees it as her opportunity to give back to the community. What a great message when we're advocating and requiring students to complete community service as a graduation requirement!"
- Shelly Lehnortt, Guidance Counselor, Eastern York High School
"Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out." This quote by James Bryant Conant – one of Teri Lerch's favorites – exemplifies her approach to her job as an educator. Starting in 2001 in a newly-created, part-time position as Career Counselor, Ms. Lerch has repeatedly stuck her neck out in positive ways to further opportunities for Eastern York High School students in leadership, career exploration, and life skills. She long advocated that this position be made full-time, and after persevering, was finally rewarded. Ms. Lerch has also introduced new programs and initiatives, while strengthening relationships with colleagues, parents, and community members. Due to her skill and effort in reaching out to so many parents and families in the Eastern York School District, The Second Mile is proud to recognize Teri Lerch as its Professional Partner of the Month!
Teri Lerch takes great satisfaction from seeing students explore career opportunities and begin to make some decisions about their futures. She has seen the proverbial "light bulb" go off with many students. As a Career Counselor at Eastern York High School, she's responsible for serving 800 students in grades 9-12. The job description is fairly extensive. It includes facilitating graduation projects, providing individual and group counseling, administering career assessments, teaching classroom career lessons, organizing career exploration field trips to various businesses, and interacting with teachers, parents, and administrators on the students' behalf.
Besides the obvious demands inherent in this position, Ms. Lerch sees career counseling as a profession facing additional challenges due to the changing world of work. With a varied and sometimes unsteady economic landscape, and with so many technological advances, she knows that nowadays it can be especially difficult to prepare students for success after graduation. Instead of counseling students primarily about careers, Teri is finding that she needs to put much more emphasis on the concept of "life-long learning," to ensure that students will be prepared for a quickly changing world. Despite the challenges, Ms. Lerch is continuously motivated by the satisfaction she gets from helping others, as well as from the relationships she's developed with students, parents, teachers, and the community.
In fact, Teri is very dedicated to parental involvement, according to Shelly Lehnortt, a School Counselor at Eastern York who has worked with Teri for eight years: "She constantly seeks to have parents volunteer for field trips, job shadows, speaking engagements, Junior Achievement (JA) volunteers and Graduation Project Interviewers." Teri instituted a new program last fall called Parent Awareness Night, inviting parents into the school for an evening presentation about the career and scheduling opportunities available for the high school students. Ms. Lehnortt also cites other examples of "the turtle sticking her neck out." It was Teri who took on the Graduation Project, once a function of the teaching staff, and focused it on the world of work, life, and skills needed for post-secondary success – "a total career focus."
The Second Mile has become a key adjunct in her work. She first learned about this agency through a former board member who had assisted her with job shadows, and it came in the form of information about the Leadership Institute. Thinking that it sounded like a great opportunity for high school sophomores to get involved in a school project with a service learning component, Teri recruited and brought a team of five sophomores in 2007. The initial project focused on the premise of running a career camp for 4th and 5th grade students in the district. Ms. Lerch and her team developed, organized, and implemented this camp in 2008, serving twenty campers with team building activities, career presenters, games, snacks, and crafts. In her own words: "It was a lot of FUN!!" Not only fun, this project garnered the Bronze Award from a potential of 50 teams that year, and was repeated this past summer, with additional student involvement.
When not working to promote career education or help her students, Teri enjoys running, collecting turtles (of all things – but not real ones), reading, gardening, and attending her children's activities. She resides in Dallastown, PA with her three sons and daughter. She is currently "counseling" her own teenagers about careers, and adds this insight: "I am realizing that career counseling is easier to do at work than at home!!!"
Despite the great demands of her job, Teri Lerch continually steps up to fill the void when she sees a need, initiating new programs or outreach in her quest to help students, and to champion career education and awareness. Her efforts to communicate with and include parents ultimately increase their investment in their children's futures, and make the whole undertaking more successful. Teri's "I can do this" attitude may create challenges for herself, but ultimately, greatly enriches the students and families with whom she works. For all her efforts and effective work, The Second Mile proudly recognizes Teri Lerch as its Professional Partner of the Month!
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