“It is a rare person who can take care of hearts while also taking care of business.” – Anonymous

This quote, imprinted on a tile, is Deborah Hardy’s inspiration to support every child. Deborah Hardy, EdD is the founder and Educational Consultant of GuidED Consulting, LLC in Mahopac, NY. Previously, Dr. Hardy was a multilingual school counselor in a diverse school district in suburban New York State where she assisted with English as a Second Language program development as an advocate for students new to the country. In her many years of experience, she served as a coordinator and as a director of K12 school counseling services where she oversaw school counselors, school social workers, and school nurses.

Dr. Hardy implemented a comprehensive K12 school counseling program aligned to the New York and American School Counselor Association (ASCA) model framework and geared towards supporting student academic, social emotional, career and college skill development. Dr. Hardy is student centered and while in the school district, she assisted with the response to intervention process and the whole child task force among many other responsibilities.

Additionally, Dr. Hardy implemented new components within the school counseling program such as a student personal learning plan connecting interests and abilities into personal goals – finding what the student is involved in as an activity, connecting it to courses that are related to the interest, and developing ideas to overcome challenges. The plan lets students engage and develop their learning pathway.

Dr. Hardy provides professional development to school districts and state school counseling associations (ASCA, NY, AZ, SC, CT, NC, MS, MT, NJ) on using student support services data to tell student stories, collaborating as a team towards student achievement, writing curriculum and lessons that make sense, emotional intelligence, mindfulness in student support services, understanding the role of student support systems in a learning organization, and developing a comprehensive school counseling program.

Dr. Hardy is a member of the New York State Education Department School Counseling Advisory Team as well as the Social Emotional Development and Learning Task Force and has held several state and local leadership positions in the school counseling profession. Dr. Hardy is the co-author of the NYS Comprehensive School Counseling Model as well as the NYS Model Activities Books. She also authored the Internet Guide for School Counselors and El Camino a La Universidad, a guidebook for the college process in Spanish. She has collaborated with several authors, including on Kids Who Think Outside the Box: Helping Your Child Thrive in a Cookie Cutter World by Stephanie Lerner.

Currently, Dr. Hardy is an adjunct professor at New York University and Long Island University inspiring future school counselors to embrace the whole child approach. Her belief: I provide counseling with a heart!