Laura Buchheit, counselor at Perryville Primary Center, will be honored on March 23 as the Missouri School Counselors Association’s Elementary Counselor of the Year.
This isn’t Buchheit’s first award; she was named the Southeast Missouri School Counselor Association’s Elementary Counselor of the Year in 2022-2023. She currently serves as president of SEMOSCA.
Buchheit is a Perryville native and lifelong resident. She and her husband Glen have two daughters, Megan and Kayla Buchheit (fiancé Caleb Hadler). She is the daughter of the late Gene and Christy (Michaud) Brown, and granddaughter of Oliver "Mitch" and Lavern Michaud and Velma Brown and the late Robert Brown.
She is a graduate of Mineral Area College and Southeast Missouri State University and holds a
Master's of Arts degree in School Counseling. She joined District 32 in 2020 as special education teacher, and then taught first grade. In 2018, she took a position as an elementary school counselor, and moved to the primary when it opened in 2019.
Principal Emily Koenig said that Buchheit’s contributions to Perryville Primary School are numerous.
“Mrs. Buchheit is an exemplary counselor and our school family continues to benefit from her counseling program and services,” Koenig said. “When Mrs. Buchheit became a counselor, she immediately recognized the need to improve the current counseling program and change the components to meet the growing social/emotional needs of our students, parents, and staff.”
Buchheit created social skills groups to pair students with similar needs, and implemented peer-to-peer assistance, empowering students to advocate for themselves and continue to support peers in solving problems, growing in independence at school and at home. She organized and published tiered behavior interventions for Perryville Primary.
“As a school, utilizing this system created a targeted tiered intervention system tracking levels of progress and recognizing when an additional level of support was needed for our students,” Koenig said. “This empowered our teachers and improved student behavior, in turn improving our school culture. I can confidently state that the structure of our counseling program and the services that are available to our school family through her as a counselor are unmatched. She has completely transformed our school counseling structure, program, and services in a positive manner. She makes our school not good but great!”
Buchheit said she is incredibly honored to be recognized at the state level. “This gives me a sense of pride in my alma mater, because it is a very clear indicator of the quality and type of programming we have been able to create and achieve here at Perryville Primary Center. Assuredly, I can say that the Care Team I am so fortunate to be part of here is incredibly developed with experts who strive for excellence in student support and outcomes. The Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) that are in practice here include universal strategies, targeted interventions, and intensive/individualized interventions that are among the best in the state.
“I strongly believe in connection building, practicing empathy, and fostering resilience and empowerment in our students. To share my genuine bottom line - as a helper, I believe in the ability of all students here and do everything possible to support their success. That is one reason I am so drawn to my professional organizations -I want to know what is possible to create for the advancement of all.”