Counseling and Wellness

Overview

Overview of Counseling Services

The Counseling and Wellness Department at Rivers reflects the school’s relational approach to student development within a community in which students are known, valued, and understood. School counselors embody the Rivers Excellence with Humanity philosophy by getting to know individual students who seek counseling and then tailoring therapeutic treatment to meet each student’s needs. This may take the form of short-term support, ongoing therapy, student/family outreach and advocacy, and/or team collaboration. Counseling services are provided by trained mental-health professionals and comply with national standards of care. The Rivers School counselors take a proactive and preventative approach to both direct counseling services and systems-level interventions, as part of a comprehensive school-counseling program that both helps individual students build skills and enhances the emotional climate of the school environment. School counselors collaborate as part of a larger Rivers wellness team to promote student well-being at the individual, grade, school division, and community levels.

The Counseling and Wellness Department at Rivers works to enhance the many systems of support that are ingrained into the school’s culture, such as the advisory program, DEI initiatives, and student-life programming. At The Rivers School, wellness education for all students and voluntary individual counseling services complement one another. School counselors collaborate with the student advisory system, the school nurse, athletic trainers, and the deans’ office to promote student well-being at multiple levels within the Rivers school, student, and family communities. 

The department, in partnership with McLean School Consultation Service, provides multi-tiered and targeted services to equip individual students with the skills needed to cope with the stresses and pressures of modern adolescence, while cultivating a school-wide culture of positive mental health in which all students can thrive. Please click here to learn more about Rivers’s partnership with McLean School Consultation Service, launched in fall 2021.

Overview of Wellness Programming

Research-based prevention programs promote healthy development by focusing on children and their main socializing environment, school. At Rivers, these “life skills” educational wellness programs are implemented in classroom settings, at school-level or grade-level assemblies, and through “opt-in” programming during students’ non-academic times. Regardless of specific content, all wellness programs encourage students to integrate accurate information with their personal and family values in order to make healthy decisions as well as to help students learn to access adult supports in appropriate ways.

Division-specific Wellness Programming

List of 2 items.

  • Middle School

    Middle School wellness classes are woven into the grade-level curricula and are also taught through advisory programming and in grade-wide meetings. Middle school wellness education covers topics including social skills and healthy relationships (communication, healthy conflict, and boundaries and consent in the context of friendships and any peer relationships), individual biological development (puberty and hygiene, nutrition and body image), and substance use and abuse prevention.
  • Upper School

    • Upper School wellness programs include: 
      • A semester-long ninth-grade Wellness Seminar course
        • One 75-minute class (single academic block) per week, through which students build a shared foundation of health, wellness, and life skills. The goal of this foundational course is to promote students’ physical, mental, emotional, and relational well-being and to minimize behaviors that put students’ health or safety at risk. By meeting once a week over their first semester as high school students, ninth graders share in learning the facts that they will need to consider in order to make informed decisions that align with their personal goals and values throughout adolescence. 
      • Division-specific programming during non-academic times on topics including mental-health literacy and skills for navigating normative stress, worry, and sadness; athlete mental health; nutrition and body image; mindfulness and self-care; substance use and abuse prevention; healthy relationships.
      • Senior post-secondary transition programming aimed at ensuring all graduates revisit their understanding of risk and protective factors in the context of becoming legal adults and transitioning to living more independently. 
        • Topics covered include:
          • Healthy vs. unhealthy relationships: consent, communication, boundaries, and power dynamics, in partnership with One Love and Speak About It
          • Substance use and abuse prevention, in partnership with the Clay Soper Memorial Fund
          • Mental health literacy, in partnership with Mental Health Collaborative, Workshops on anti-racism, redefining masculinity, restorative justice, gender violence prevention, consent, and sexual health facilitated by scholar, educator, and activist Duane de Four

Equitable Access to Care

The Counseling and Wellness department operates from a DEI framework in order to advance inclusion in the full Rivers experience for all students. To this end, the Rivers School provides equitable and confidential access to licensed school counselors during the academic day at no additional cost to families. This means that students have the autonomy to schedule appointments with our counselors for single sessions or on an on-going basis.

School counselors always encourage students to communicate openly and directly with their parents/caregivers, and will not mandate communication or break confidentiality unless there are imminent risks to the student's safety or the safety of others. The counselors work as part of a larger Wellness Team at Rivers. There are many times when taking a wraparound approach to care best serves individual students' needs. With the student's consent and permission, this approach may include working with families/caregivers, teachers, administrators and/or outpatient providers to coordinate care in order to best support students.

Information for Current Families

Current caregivers and students should visit RiversNet to find more detailed information about the department's confidentiality and collaboration policies, as well as an extensive list of external mental health resources. Individuals who would like to get in touch with a school counselor may utilize the "referral form" located in the "Counseling Forms" box at the top right-hand side of this page. They also are welcome and encouraged to call or email counselors directly.

Meet the Counseling & Wellness Team

List of 9 members.

  • Photo of Eliza Adler

    Eliza Adler 

    Director of Counseling Services
    339-686-4504
    Middlebury College - BA
    BU School of Social Work - MSW, LICSW
    Bio
  • Photo of Megan Delano

    Megan Delano 

    School Counselor, Head of Wellness Programming
    339-686-4511
    Naropa University - MA
    Lesley University - BS
  • Photo of Melissa Anderson

    Melissa Anderson 

    Head of Upper School, History
    339-686-2346
    University of California/Berkley - Ph. D
    Princeton University - AB
  • Photo of John Bower

    John Bower 

    Head of Middle School
    339-686-2281
    Haverford College - BA
    Bio
  • Photo of Sarah Freeman

    Sarah Freeman 

    MS Dean of Students, Science, Varsity Field Hockey/Girls' Lacrosse Asst. & MS Nordic Ski Head Coach
    339-686-4515
    Bowdoin College - BS
    Columbia University - MA
    Bio
  • Photo of James Long

    James Long 

    Assistant Head of School
    339-686-2272
    Harvard Graduate School of Education - Ed.M.
    Bowdoin College - BA
    Bio
  • Photo of William Mills

    William Mills 

    Upper School Dean of Student Life, History
    339-686-2429
    Connecticut College - BA
    Harvard University - ALM
    Bio
  • Photo of Tess Powell

    Tess Powell 

    Learning Services
    339-686-4546
    William James College - PsyD
    Tufts University - MA
    Fairfield University - BA
  • Photo of Claudia Silva

    Claudia Silva 

    School Nurse
    339-686-4480
    Simmons College - BS
    Bio