Pierre LaRocco

Pierre Angelo-Joseph LaRocco, MEd., worked as a counselor at South Philadelphia High School. He was instrumental in dealing with the crisis the school experienced Dec. 3, 2009, when Asian students were targets of racially charged attacks by black students. Pierre took charge of creating and implementing a diversity curriculum that started the healing and understanding processes between both groups. He then continued to create and implement ideas and strategies to turn around the culture of the school. Pierre helped to design a new Student Assistant Program tracking system to better identify the interventions being used and help the school move toward their Community School Model. Pierre also co-authored the K-12 School Counseling Plan for the School District of Philadelphia.

Pierre is currently assigned to Widener Memorial School where he counsels the area's students with most complex medical and fragility needs.

Articles by Pierre LaRocco

• A school’s guide to human trafficking

  Tuesday, August 29, 2017

  Human trafficking has no boundaries. It is not limited to third-world countries, and ​an estima​ted 200,000 American children are at risk for trafficking into the sex industry. This happens to children all over America, in urban, suburban and rural areas alike.

• What educators need to know about ‘13 Reasons Why’

  Friday, June 02, 2017

  "13 Reasons Why" is a popular book and Netflix TV series that is stirring up a lot of emotion and conversation around suicide. However, in some instances it is seen as a glamorization of suicide. I want to take a look at the events in the book and how can we as educators can speak to the young people we work with about this book and subject.

• 6 simple steps for de-escalating students

  Friday, April 21, 2017

  De-escalating students is one of the most important things a counselor does. It is a skill to be learned and honed. Students who need de-escalating are in great crisis, and many times they do not know what made them so upset or how to calm down on their own. When students are like this, they cannot just snap out of it. They need the systematic process of calming down.

• Dealing with large-scale tragedies at school

  Tuesday, December 06, 2016

  It seems like we hear about large-scale tragedies on a daily basis — from someone tragically dying at the hands of the authorities to terrorism overseas. Everyone seems to be affected by this, including our students. We were once able to say that school is a safe place for our students with people who care about them. It was their safe haven from everything on the outside. Well, it has been proven over and over again, that is not the case anymore as we see school violence and shootings on the rise nationwide.

• The key to counseling in urban schools

  Tuesday, July 05, 2016

  One thing counselors must do in urban environments is build relationships with students. There are many reasons why this is more important in urban areas, but the main reason is students in urban areas learn not to trust people from outside the neighborhood.

• Fostering a relationship of caring

  Tuesday, June 21, 2016

  School counselors must have many tough conversations with students. However, if we do some ground work in creating a caring relationship with students, then those conversations become much easier to have. What is a relationship of caring? I consider it a relationship of mutual respect where one party (the student) knows the other party (the counselor) has the student's best interest in mind even when the latter is holding the student accountable for his/her actions.