After a year of being available to students, the IU School of Education’s first non-teaching major continues to grow significantly and provide students like Jee Yoon Park and Ashlyn Roy a chance to serve through their future careers.

The major, a B.S.Ed. in Counseling and Student Services (CASS), aims to teach students how to communicate, understand diversity, equity and inclusion and listen and help, according to Jesse Steinfeldt, Associate Professor in Counseling and Educational Psychology and coordinator of the major. Students in the degree program are able to choose between two tracks, the Counseling Psychology track and the Higher Education and Student Affairs track.

Park was working toward a major in psychology and minor in counseling, but jumped at the chance to add a double major in CASS when the program was added: “The counseling courses I have taken all are informative and collaborative, with people being able to talk about their own experiences or views about certain topics. I also love that the counseling course and instructors all find multiculturalism important and take multicultural issues seriously, as it is a very important topic for me personally,” she added.

Park hopes to go to graduate school for Counseling Psychology and eventually earn her Ph.D. While she originally wanted to be a practitioner rather than a researcher in the field, she recently started getting interested in research.

Roy decided on the Counseling and Student Services major because she always wanted to help people directly through her work. She had decided to minor in counseling, but immediately changed her major, saying she finally felt on the right track for her future career.

"The professors in this program are amazing people who are incredible at what they do,” Roy said. “I have learned and retained so much information from the courses I have taken for CASS, and I have already been able to apply them to aspects of my life outside of classes. I receive a well-rounded education about mental health counseling while also becoming incredibly culturally aware. One of the program's best attributes in my opinion is its dedication to diversity and multicultural equality. I believe every program at IU should be just as culturally-informed as the CASS program.”

One thing Roy said she realized since beginning this program is that it can be applied to so many different careers and so many different groups of people. When she began the major, she intended on becoming a sexuality and sexual health counselor, but now wants to combine her interest in sex therapy with her passion for women empowerment to eventually help women embrace their sexuality and female identity completely.

Park advises any students interested in the major to first take Intro to Counseling Psychology, and then talk to an Advisor in the School of Education or a counseling course instructor: “Talking to many different people, both in the Psychology department and Counseling Psychology department, helped me decide on my decision to pursue Counseling Psychology. Plus, they are all very nice and informative!”

Roy advises potential students considering this major to take full advantage of the opportunities and resources presented to them and reach out to some of the professionals in the CASS program to discuss what it entails and what their path may look like during and after college.

“Every person I have interacted with in this program has been incredibly helpful and supportive of my path to fulfilling my goals,” she said. “If you decide to pursue this major, still take advantage of every opportunity given to you! There are endless opportunities for personal, professional and academic development through the people you meet and the events offered in this program. IU has some of the best in the field so try to build relationships and build your network!”