School counselors across America are facing overwhelming caseloads, but one innovative educator is using artificial intelligence to extend her reach and impact. Elementary school counselor Hanna Kemble-Mick, a finalist for 2025 School Counselor of the Year, has developed AI chatbots that provide immediate support for students dealing with social-emotional issues, career exploration, and academic assignments. By strategically deploying these digital assistants while maintaining her crucial personal connections, Kemble-Mick demonstrates how AI can serve as a powerful complement to human expertise in addressing the national counselor shortage.
The big picture: With 450 students under her care—nearly double the recommended ratio—Kemble-Mick has created AI tools that provide immediate support when she’s unavailable in person.
- The American School Counselor Association reports a national average of 376 students per counselor, far exceeding recommended levels and limiting counselors’ ability to provide timely intervention.
- Kemble-Mick emphasizes these AI tools aren’t replacements for human counselors but rather assistants that ensure students always have somewhere to turn.
Key innovation: Kemble-Mick’s most popular creation is “Pickles the Classroom Support Dog,” a chatbot that provides immediate emotional support and coping strategies.
- The chatbot guides students through deep breathing exercises and helps them formulate “I feel” statements when they’re experiencing emotional difficulties.
- She reserves these AI tools for students in grades three through six, noting that “younger students might have a hard time understanding that this isn’t a real person.”
Beyond emotional support: The AI tools also help students explore career possibilities without the limitations of stereotypes or biases.
- Students enter their interests and hobbies, and the AI suggests career paths they might not have considered—like recommending “esports manager” to a student who enjoys dirt biking, organization, and video games.
- “By the time kids are 9, they start to develop stereotypes of what they think they can and can’t be based on their ZIP code, gender, race,” Kemble-Mick explains. “This doesn’t know any of those things about you, and so it disrupts the bias and allows kids to really dream.”
Academic applications: Kemble-Mick has expanded her AI toolkit to include personalized academic support, creating character-based chatbots for specific assignments.
- For a third-grade history project, she developed chatbots representing historical figures that students could interview and interact with.
- “The engagement is high,” she notes, acknowledging the challenge of competing for students’ attention in today’s digital landscape.
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