Counseling Today - February 2024
February 11, 2025
Here is your February newsletter! We also encourage you to follow us on Instagram for more regular reminders and updates.
We are proud to say that our counseling department is a Recognized ASCA Model Program (RAMP), with CDH having earned RAMP status during the summer, 2023. We are the only private high school in Minnesota to have this designation. Feel free to read more about this great honor, what it took to earn, and what it means for our students!
If you need to contact us, take a look at our contact page on the school website to determine the best person to help address your needs.
School Counseling
All CDH Students
Registration
All students should have completed registration for their 25-26 school year classes by now. If your student has not yet registered, they should see their school counselor or the registrar, Ms. Carroll, as soon as possible.
If you registered for Yearbook, Common Ground, JROTC-LET4 Honors,and/or NEXT Internship, watch for an email to come your way with an application. If you would like to register for People Finding People (PFP), please be sure to get an application from counseling and turn it in by Monday, February 10th.
Peer Tutoring
The CDH Peer Tutoring Program is still available for any student to receive individual tutoring during Flex or After School. Sign up here.
11th Grade
PFP Applications
Juniors interested in People Finding People next year must turn in their applications to Ms. Shead or Mr. Beithon by Monday, February 10th. PFP is a senior class that teaches mentoring skills and builds community. Students mentor 9th, 10th, and transfer students throughout the year.
AP Students
AP registration for year long and for 1st and 2nd Trimester only classes passed on November 4th. An exam can still be dropped or added between now and February 24th, but for an additional $40 fee. AP classes that started in the 2nd Trimester have a registration/drop deadline of February 24thwithout an additional fee.
College Counseling
All CDH Students
NCAA
There will be an NCAA Eligibility Information Meeting for any prospective scholarship college athletes on Thursday, Feb 20. It will take place during Flex 2 in Group Room #2 in the Counseling Department.
Sophomores & Juniors
CDH Education Fair
Our annual CDH Education Fair will take place on Thursday, April 10 in the Joe Mauer Fieldhouse. Sophomores, Juniors, and families, are invited to come explore college options! This open house event will be held from 6:30 to 8 pm and a list of attending colleges will be available prior to the event.
Juniors
Junior Meetings
If you have not already done so, please schedule a meeting for post-high school planning with your student and their college counselor. Dates are available through the end of March.
Students with last names A-K see Mitchell Reynolds: Sign up here
Students with last names L-Z see Laura Nelson: Sign up here
ACT
Juniors will take the ACT (no writing) on March 25. Students are pre-registered for the exam. Students who qualified for accommodations will be notified via email by their school counselor.
Seniors
Schulze Family Scholarship
Applications are open for the Richard M. Schulze Family Foundation College Scholarship. This is a $5,000/year, renewable scholarship. To qualify you must have a minimum, unweighted cumulative GPA of 3.0, have attended a Catholic grade school K-8 and be graduating from a Catholic high school. This award is designed to help middle-income families who do not qualify for a Federal Pell Grant, but still show unmet financial need on the FAFSA. Applications must be completed by April 1, 2025. Please visit schulzefamilyfoundation.org for more information.
The FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid 2025-2026) opened on December 1. Start at www.fafsa.gov to create an account. This FAFSA uses your 2023 tax information. Feel free to contact Ms. Nelson or Mr. Reynolds with questions.
Chemical Health Counseling
Chemical Health Week at CDH March 21st thru April 1, 2025
As part of our ongoing commitment to prevention and wellness, we have invited the following speakers to address chemical health for our CDH students:
- Know the Truth for Sophomores March 21
Know the Truth will address all sophomores Friday, March 21st during their English classes in the Commons. This is the substance use prevention program of Mn Adult and Teen Challenge.
They have led over 10,000 presentations and have spoken to over 460,000 students in over 160 high schools and middle schools. They share stories of personal struggles with substance use and present students with information about the dangers of alcohol and drug use.
- PEASE Academy for Juniors March 24
Michael Durchlag, academy director and select students will present to the Juniors, Monday March 24th during their English classes in the Commons. Located in the heart of Dinkytown, P.E.A.S.E. Academy: an acronym for Peers Enjoying a Sober Education, is the oldest recovery high school in the United States, serving students in recovery since February 1989. Michael will explain how the cycle of addiction begins and students will share their personal stories of recovery.
- Step Up Program for Seniors March 28
Students from The Augsburg University StepUP Program will come to speak to the seniors, Friday March 28th in the theatre during their religion classes. The StepUP program is a college recovery-based support program aimed at providing structure for enrolled students. This college recovery program is meant to give students a full, enriched collegiate experience with the support and encouragement they need to stay sober. Students will share their recovery journeys and take questions from the students about their experience.
- Prevention Solutions for Freshman March 31 and April 1
We have invited prevention specialists from Prevention Solutions within the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation to work with our 9th graders Monday, March 31 and Tuesday April 1 during their Values classes. Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is a non-profit organization that offers prevention and recovery solutions nationwide and across the entire continuum of care for youth and adults. Prevention Solutions provides alcohol, nicotine, and other drug education to schools and communities around the world.
Two Hazelden Prevention Specialists as well as Dr. Jules Nolan will present a parents workshop Monday March 31 from 6:00 to 7:30 pm in the Commons. Dr. Nolan is a psychologist, author, speaker and expert on mental health and parenting. An invited speaker both nationally and internationally, Dr. Nolan will talk about stress, anxiety, perfectionism and motivation in parenting adolescents. These three facilitators will offer support and guidance in helping your children enjoy a drug-free adolescence.
Chemical Free Corner
Honesty
Chemical misuse often starts with dishonesty; dishonesty with ourselves and others. Challenges and difficulties start to mount and we stay silent about them. Feeling overwhelmed can follow and life feels too hard to face. Chemical peace of mind may seem the quickest solution. And it is a solution…. to an underlying problem. The goal would be to address the problem directly before addiction becomes another problem.
People don’t always lie because they are bad but because they are trying to shield themselves from guilt, shame and fear. They may be trying to protect a loved one from the reality of their chemical use.
We can all be a little dishonest in our daily lives: not correcting cashiers when they give us more change than we are due, telling a friend or colleague an untruth so as to get out of a social or work commitment, embellishing a story for social cache, saying you are OK to someone who wants to help when you are really not. We can feel justified in our dishonesty when we feel it stems from not wanting to hurt others. It can also be scary to be vulnerable when telling the truth. There may have been a time in our lives where it didn’t feel safe to tell the truth so we learned this habit of dishonesty so well that it feels strange to be honest.
How to start being more honest:
1) Make a commitment to become more honest with yourself and others.
2) Become aware of the little untruths you may tell and why you feel the need to be dishonest.
3) Engage in a support system that values honesty.
4) Acknowledge your feelings and emotions. (Suppressing them can lead to more emotional pain)
7) Address feelings by writing and talking about them to a friend, counselor or group.
8) Engage in activities that will help you work through feelings like art, exercise, spending time with people you care about and who care about you.
Honesty is also about being our genuine, authentic selves. If someone stops using but does not make honesty a big part of their life, they are more likely to use again. In other words, telling untruths is not an effective coping skill and can be a relapse trigger. If we identify and recognize our challenges we can take the next step on working on their solutions. Facing things as they come is the best strategy for sober living.
Honesty is something we can practice each day and it brings us peace of mind. We can become beacons of light in what can sometimes seem a dishonest world.
Chemical Health Counselor
Cretin-Derham Hall
Important Dates
February 19
10th Grade Retreats
February 24
AP Registration Deadline
Counseling Data
Though a bit shorter than most months due to Christmas break, January still had 578 visits! Juniors and sophomores were the most frequent visitors, as juniors are still doing their junior post-secondary planning meetings and sophomores had to meet with their school counselor for registration approval.
