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In the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak, school counselors played an essential role in helping students, teachers, and families pivot to new learning environments and implemented services to promote students' academic, social-emotional, and career development. In this study, we analyzed school counselors' (N = 589) delivery of program services and their individual and school characteristics to identify four approaches to school counseling: reactive, universal, consultative/collaborative, and comprehensive during the first wave of the pandemic. School counselors in the reactive profile spent most of their time engaged in noncounselor-duties and reported the highest levels of burnout. Conversely, counselors belonging to the comprehensive profile devoted the most time to delivering consultation, coordination, counseling, and curriculum services and limited engagement in noncounseling-related duties. This study emphasizes the importance of defining the school counselors' roles and responsibilities and the extent to which school counselors were able to deliver their school counselor services during the global pandemic.

We utilized a mixed-methods design to understand how a national sample of 589 school counselors adapted their approach to address K–12 students’ academic, social/emotional, and career development during the COVID-19 pandemic. More specifically, we examined how COVID-19–induced disparities influenced school counselors’ delivery of services. We identified six themes using thematic analysis and conducted a t test to further understand what services and strategies counselors were actively using 6 months after the onset of COVID-19. Our findings suggest that school counselors continued to adjust their comprehensive school counseling programs to address pandemic-induced disparities.

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This pragmatic, real world study examined the effects of the All 4 Kids© intervention on preschoolers’ mastery of movement skills and determined whether the instruction had greater impact than natural development. Methods included a quasi-experimental intervention-comparison subsample of 379 children (COMPARISON) and a pretest-posttest design with convenience scale-up sampling of 2817 preschoolers (SCALE-UP). Children receiving education and dance instruction 3 times/week for 8 weeks were assessed using the Preschool Movement Assessment to evaluate skills pre and post intervention. Using repeated measures ANOVA, McNemar and Wilcoxon signed ranks tests, preschooler’s participation in the intervention resulted in greater improvement in 12 movement skills (F = 83.451, df = 1, p < 0.001, η p 2 = 0.555), balance (p = 0.028), hopping (t = −3.545, df = 112, p = 0.001) and crossing the midline (p < 0.001) than natural development (COMPARISON). In the SCALE-UP study, children significantly improved in all measures based on post-intervention scores. Significant differences were observed between Hispanic and non-Hispanic children for the 12-skills (b = −0.758, se = 0.161, p < 0.001) using hierarchical linear models; boys’ and girls’ scores were not differentially impacted by the intervention. Therefore, implementation of interventions focused on fundamental movement skill development have the potential to remediate secular motor skill decline in young children.

Youth with visual impairments are more likely to be overweight than peers without visual impairments and often struggle with their locomotor skills. Locomotor development can combat unhealthy body weight statuses by supporting physical activity behaviors. There are no longitudinal investigations concerning the locomotor skill and body mass index (BMI) developmental trajectories of youth with visual impairments. The purpose of this study was to examine the 3-year developmental trajectory of the locomotor skills and BMI of youth with visual impairments including differential effects of self-reported gender and degree of vision. Participants (N = 34, Mage = 11.75 years, 47% female) showed severely delayed and arrested locomotor development with increases in BMI across 3 years regardless of self-reported gender or degree of vision. Participants failed to breech a proficiency barrier of motor competence to combat against increases in BMI across time. Additional longitudinal inquiries are needed.