La Salle-Peru High School Superintendent Steven Wrobleski was named the 2023 Illinois School Counselor Association Impact Award winner for a school administrator.
He was nominated by the L-P counseling department chair Emily Carney for his continued support of the counseling programs.
“When I wrote the nomination it was focused on how he created a fifth counseling position at the school,” Carney said. “Throughout my 11 years, he has done things to help us align with state and national standards so we can grow into the program we are today.”
The award recognizes administrators that have supported school counselors, counseling programs and provided leadership in the further development of a counseling program, according to an L-P Facebook post.
“(Wrobleski) has always been excellent at listening to those things and being very responsive and receptive to new things.”
— Emily Carney, La Salle-Peru High School counseling department chair
Wrobleski said it was humbling to be nominated for the award by the people he spends a significant amount of time with and said it was important to recognize the award as a collaborative effort.
“I sometimes struggle in terms of receiving these accolades because it really is a team effort,” Wrobleski said.
Wrobleski has been with L-P for 18 years and served as superintendent for the last 11. His ability to maintain open lines of communication with his students and staff has enabled him to build long-lasting relationships.
“He is such a kind-hearted person who truly puts people before himself,” said Max Wertz, a former L-P student. “Throughout my years at L-P, Dr. Wrobleski was and always will be a kind-hearted person.”
Carney said the counseling program has changed over the years she has been with the school to include more of a developmental mental model.
“The counseling program was heavier on traditional counselor guidance used to do as opposed to a school counselor because we’re trained to do academic college career and social emotion counseling and that was part of his vision too,” Carney said. “That we evolve and become exactly what we’re supposed to be.”
Wrobleski makes sure he is available to students throughout the day, even having lunch meetings with students to ensure their academic and personal success.
“Our kids bring different needs and challenges than I think we’ve seen 10, 15, 20 years ago,” Carney said. “There is such a need to meet the emotional needs of kids, their social needs as well as the support they need for college and or career planning.”
Carney said L-P does assessments every year to identify what the student’s needs are so they are able to best address them and look at national trends – such as the mental health crisis to determine what their students specifically need.
“I feel like when you are meeting the student’s needs as a whole, you’re going to get the best output from the student and the best success rates academically and personally,” she said.
Wrobleski said if he has learned anything about education it’s about building relationships, letting people know you care about them, fostering their trust and encouraging those around you.
“I have always felt supported,” Carney said. “When you are going to bring something forward and change things that have not been that way before. He has always been excellent at listening to those things and being very responsive and receptive to new things.”