A Couple Counselors

There’s a lot that happens along the way in all of our lives. None of us arrive in adulthood untouched. We carry history, mistakes, and moments we’d love to redo.

One of the things I appreciated most about working in drug and alcohol counseling was the way people’s pasts were handled. Everyone had one. Accountability mattered. But people were expected to learn, change, and develop—rather than be permanently defined by their worst moment.

That environment didn’t excuse harm. It didn’t erase consequences. It made something else possible: responsibility paired with forward movement.

That distinction has stayed with me.

In grad school, at West Chester University, a professor told me that we are expected to be lifelong learners. At the time, I understood that to be a professional requirement for school counselors in the form of credits, licensure, and compliance. I didn’t understand how deeply that idea applies outside the buildings and beyond our job titles.

Learning doesn’t stop when we leave the building for the day. Neither does development. This isn’t about perfection. It never was. It’s about progress over time.

Development Keeps Systems Ethical

Growth is how individuals learn—and how systems stay ethical over time. That belief sits at the center of this writing.

Educators owe young people environments where learning is expected, supported, and made possible. Not environments where mistakes become permanent identities. Not spaces where a single misstep overshadows capacity, effort, or change.

When systems freeze people at their lowest point, they don’t just punish behavior—they confuse behavior with identity. And that confusion has consequences.

Young People Learn by Watching Adults

Young people don’t learn what growth looks like because we tell them to believe in it. They learn by watching how adults respond to mistakes.

If we, as school staff, treat missteps as permanent, students internalize that mistakes end a persons belonging.

If adults treat missteps as moments for accountability, learning, and repair, students learn how responsibility works—and how trust can be rebuilt.

That distinction matters. It’s developmental. It’s ethical. And it shapes school culture more than any slogan ever could.

Accountability Is Not the Enemy of Change

This conversation often gets framed the wrong way.

Development does not remove consequences. Accountability still matters. Harm still requires responsibility. Boundaries still exist.

What development determines is what happens after responsibility is taken. Repair requires readiness. Trust requires demonstrated change.

Redemption—when it occurs—is earned through sustained learning over time, not granted automatically.

People are not frozen at their worst moment. But neither is change guaranteed without effort.

That’s not leniency. That’s developmental reality.

Educators Are Human Too

It’s hard being an educator in a role that demands both professionalism and visibility. We carry responsibility not just for instruction, but for modeling behavior under pressure.

School counselors and teachers go through illness, loss, burnout, family strain, and other major life disruptions—and yes, sometimes even the emotional devastation of the Eagles losing the Super Bowl. We’re professionals, but we’re also human.

With all of that, we don’t always respond perfectly. Sometimes our regulation goes off the deep end. Sometimes our judgment isn’t as clean as we’d like it to be.

That doesn’t mean learning stops. In fact, disruption is often what forces reflection.

Awareness often increases before behavior improves. That’s how the nervous system works. Integration takes time. Development is rarely linear.

Why This Matters for Students

This isn’t just a personal belief—it’s a systems question. What do our schools teach students about what happens after mistakes?

If we want students to take responsibility, reflect, and repair, then adults have to model what accountability paired with learning actually looks like. Not defensiveness. Not erasure. Not permanence.

The foundation of counseling work is the belief that people are capable of change. If we don’t believe that, it’s worth asking why we chose this field in the first place.

Carrying It Forward

My writing focuses on development, not permanence. On accountability without identity collapse. On ethical systems that recognize harm while still allowing people to learn and integrate over time.

Growth is not about protecting anyone from consequences. It’s about making sure consequences don’t become the end of learning. Growth is how individuals learn—and how systems stay ethical over time. If we want students to grow, we have to believe growth is real. Let’s teach them progress over perfection.

-Charles