DEI Symposium Series - Instagrowth: Picturing Growth for At-Risk Students

This episode is part of the DEI Symposium Series, developed from the DEI Symposium presented at the 2025 NCDA Global Career Development Conference in Atlanta, Georgia.

In this episode Dr. Frank Gorritz hosts Dr. Natasha Barnes-Gwynn, a clinical professor and career consultant. The conversation centers around supporting at-risk students through innovative strategies. Dr. Barnes-Gwynn discusses her unique Instagrowth concept, which uses Instagram as a framework to engage students incorporating social-emotional learning (SEL) and career development theories. She emphasizes the importance of connection, shifting the deficit-focused perspective on at-risk students to one of empowerment and strength identification. Dr. Barnes-Gwynn also examines the critical role of SEL components such as self-awareness, self-regulation, and decision-making skills in academic and personal growth. By integrating career counseling theories and practical SEL strategies, she advocates for a holistic approach to nurturing all students' potential, emphasizing the collective responsibility of educators, counselors, and parents. The podcast concludes with reflections on the need to develop tools, possibly even an app, to expand and implement these innovative strategies more broadly.

Dr. Natasha Barnes-Gwynn, CCC, NCC, FCD-I is a Clinical Professor at Southern New Hampshire University. She also serves as a career consultant through her private practice, Increasing Our Understanding (I.O.U.) Consultation, LLC. Dr. Barnes-Gwynn is a newly appointed board member for the Council of Accreditation and Related Educational Programs.

Dr. Frank Gorritz FitzSimons, LPC, is a counselor educator in Florida. He is a nationally recognized scholar and counselor educator on topics including providing affirmative counseling care to queer and transgender communities of color, providing multicultural supervision, utilizing diverse approaches to counseling work, as well as addressing and disrupting white supremacy in counselor education. 

Transcript

Career Practitioner Conversations Podcast

National Career Development Association

Instagrowth: Picturing Growth for At-Risk Students Using SEL and Career Theories

Frank Gorritz and Natasha Barnes-Gwynn

February 17, 2026 

Welcome to the podcast. I'm Melissa Venable, NCDA, director of Professional Development, and this episode continues our 2025 DEI symposium series with a conversation about working with at-risk students., Counselor educator, Dr. Frank Gorritz hosts this episode with his guest, Dr. Natasha Barnes-Gwynn. Dr. Barnes-Gwynn is a clinical professor at Southern New Hampshire University and serves as a career consultant through her private practice, increasing our understanding consultation LLC.

All right, Dr. Barnes-Gwynn, first and foremost, it's an honor to have you on this podcast. , so , your session at the DEI symposium, which was such a sleigh by the way, um, really focused on Insta growth and the idea of picturing growth for at-risk students using social emotional learning and career development.

What inspired this idea, um, for you? So I have a private practice and I'm always trying to come up with crafty ways of reaching, uh, the youth that I work with and also connecting with their, . Teachers or school counselors that are working with them as well. So, , Instagram is something that young people can relate to.

It's something that older people can relate to. So I thought, what if I put a spin on Instagram and called it INTA growth, um, to help them really understand how. Career development strategies and social and emotional learning strategies can be beneficial in fostering growth, um, academically and personally, , for these students.

Because it sounds like when you were thinking about Insta Growth, you were trying to think about, and first of all, absolutely love the creativity and passion you put into wanting to connect with students. But that's the sort of the theme I'm sensing from you is, you know, you're always trying to find ways to connect for sure with students and, and how, for sure.

Does that sound right? What I found absolutely. What I found is that, uh, students respond to connection. And so regardless of, um, how great we think we are as adults and whatever roles we play, if we don't have a connection with them, if they don't feel like we care or we are in tune with their culture. Um, then we usually miss the mark with them.

So I try to stay as current as I can with, uh, their, the things that they like and the things that they're interested in, and try to use that to, uh, engage with them. In teaching them these strategies because I think it's important that not only do the people that work with them know these strategies, but some of this stuff they can use themselves to become better students and just to become better people and to grow, um, so that they can be successful professionally and personally.

So yes, I think it is absolutely imperative that, um, I connect with the students that I work with. I really like that because I can really sense that, you know, you care about the students and you care about, , their own ability to become the adults that they want to be, rather than just like focusing on ourselves as we're the adults who know everything.

It seems like you see the kids differently in a sense of when you're working with youth and especially at-risk youth, this is about helping to empower them. Absolutely, absolutely. They get enough of people seeing the negative, uh, in them. And so for me it is about empowerment, as you stated, and also being able to focus on strength areas for them.

You know, we talk a lot about what they. Aren't successful with, as it relates to academics or, extracurriculars. We talk a lot about that as adults, you know, they're not doing well with this, they're not doing well with that, but how much focus do we give to what they're actually doing well with , and channeling that energy in a positive way to help them be successful?

Like, I just, I think that. Sometimes there's an antiquated thought process that's taking place with school systems and individuals that are working with the youth, and I think that there has to be some shift in order for us to see, uh, a shift in. The adults to come. You know, we, we always talk about our kids are our future, but we start prepping the kids of today to be the adults of our future.

So if we don't tap into what's going to benefit them now, I, I just don't really see how we're going to promote, uh, these model citizens that we're hoping that these youth turn out to be. Absolutely. And tell me a little bit more about that too, because I also see that as well, you know, across various professions that work with students about this idea of, when we think of the term at risk, you know, there seems to be sort of a deficit lens that's always attached, that there's always some sort of problem and you're trying to focus on the opposite.

Tell me more, tell us more about that. So when I think about the at-risk population, I really don't even like to use that terminology in referring to students that just need additional support. Um, when we, you know, one of the things that I talked about in the presentation was Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

And when we look at these students that we are considering at risk, are we really looking at the factors that may be impacting their at risk status? Um, whether it is their need for love and affection, or it is their basic needs aren't being met or, you know, they're not getting the attention that they need, um, when it comes to their academics and the support that they need, whatever it is that's keeping them from reaching their self actualization, are we really tapping into that to figure out what the at risk.

Uh, symptomology is, for lack of a better term, so I, I think of these students, you know, we talk about the. Gifted and exceptional students. And when we talk about students that are in need, um, when it comes to the exceptional students, we really focus in on, hey, these are areas that they struggle in because there's a need there.

So my thing is, we should have the same lens when we're looking at all students who may be having struggles, but they don't fall under the category of quote unquote exceptional students. . And I'm using exceptional. But we do understand that the, the, , area that these students are placed in is our special education part of our school system.

And so when we talk about that part of the school system, those students are always seen from a lens of, oh, they have needs that we need to meet. But when we're talking about students that we identify as being a part of general population that may have some of the same needs that need to be met, but they don't qualify for the special education.

Uh, ranking or rating. Um, I think we, we missed the mark with those students and we let them fall between the cracks because it's like, you should be doing better. You just aren't. And we're not taking into consideration that there are many factors that could be impacting why they're not. Whether it be behavioral health, mental health, whatever that looks like.

There's so much that. That encompasses a student's experience. And it's not just the academic piece of it, it's, it is the whole person that shows up in the academic space, and we've gotta make sure that we're taking care of the whole person. So yes, when it comes to. The term at risk, there is a negative connotation to it, but it is my hope that I can assist people in seeing, um, that it's not, they're at risk because of something.

It's not just they're choosing to be at risk. And how can we, as the adults working in these different positions, help them to be less at risk by accommodating or working with them to relieve some of these stressors that they're having that are causing them this at risk status. Absolutely no, and I really appreciate you breaking that down for us listeners.

Now with that too, , I was thinking about as you were talking sort of the complexities a little bit with the idea of growth. Because when we think about youth, you know, you are really highlighting and hitting it home for all of us that we should be paying attention to all of our youth and not just the ones who are labeled at risk.

So how do we go about picturing growth? When working with our current youth, whether they're considered at risk, exceptional, or somewhere in the middle, what does growth look like there and what should we know about that? So one of the things that stands out to me when I talk about picturing growth, it's how we see them and we, I just kind of talked about that a little bit, but I feel like we treat people how we see them.

And so if we see them from a negative space, then we treat them as such. If we see them as you can do better, you're just choosing not to, then we hold them to these, um, standards that are. Maybe unreachable for them because of the factors that are impacting their growth. And so that's one of the things that I really zoom in on is how we see the students, because I, I generally work with the middle school population, early high school, and I just think they get a bad.

You know, they're in their early adolescence and they're trying to figure out who they are and where they fit in society, and who they like and who likes them. And it's just so many other factors going on in addition to I've got to learn. And so I think that sometimes developmentally we can see them. In a way that doesn't really capture the whole picture of who they are, just because of some of the developmental things that are happening with them.

Yes. They may sometimes think they know it all. Yeah. You know, but that is a part of adolescence and so I just, I think that we've gotta be able to see past. And be able to see, um, the whole person, you know? So that's one of the things, um, embracing those challenges that present instead of seeing them as, as, um, or instead of avoiding the challenges or seeing them as Right.

Things that we don't wanna tackle or can't tackle. So making sure that we are taking ownership of our role in these. Youth lives because if we function as a teacher, a counselor, a career professional, working with these individuals, we have to make sure that we're owning our part in their growth and their development.

Um, you know, a lot of times we'll hear where the parents aren't doing their part and there's a piece for parents as well. Um, that where the parents have to, you know, do their part, but it's a collective system that works together to make sure that these youth. Become productive citizens and are productive in the space that they're in presently.

And so I think we've gotta make sure that we're not avoiding the challenges that may present when it comes to working with this group. Even if their mouths may be smart or they, you know, they may be not wanting to listen to us all the time. We, we have to overcome those challenges to ensure that we see the growth in them.

. And I would say the, the other thing that I want to, , kinda highlight is learning from feedback instead of ignoring feedback helps us to see the growth because, you know, we, we often talk about this population. They think they know everything, but I, I would be willing to say that there's some of us out there to think we know everything too.

And so we, I was thinking that, yes. So we've gotta be willing to learn from these youth like. I've just discovered over time that they are so creative and so talented and you know, they get such a bad rep for their use of technology and their engagement with technology all the time. But like such great things come from their engagement with technology and their use of technology.

So I think we've gotta understand that as times change and as we evolve that. We're not always the teachers. Sometimes we can learn from the youth, and so having them give us feedback about what they think could help us, help them. And how they feel like we could help them. I think we've gotta be able to accept that feedback and apply it versus hearing it and ignoring it.

And I think oftentimes not, I don't know if I'll say oftentimes, but I think sometimes that's where the disconnect comes in with the youth and the older population, is that they tell us things, do we actually listen to what they tell us? They give us feedback, do we actually apply the feedback? And so one of the things that I pride myself on is evaluation, having sit down conversations with them about what they think, um, could help them be successful and what growth looks like for them.

Because I need their feedback so that I can see growth through their lenses and help them to, to get to the place that they wanna be. A hundred percent. Absolutely. Because I mean, no matter where we are in our developmental journey, we will always have some sort of parallel to the folks who become before us and the folks who are coming after us.

Absolutely. There's. Truth be told, if we stay open, you know, there's so much we can really understand when we listen. So through that lens too, I'm, I wanting all of our listeners to like, listen in on this like super hard right now. Um, what are the needs that we need to know about that impact growth? Like what are the major essentials that are important when we think of this term at risk youth?

So I mentioned social and emotional learning, and this is a term that, , has been cultivated in the educational setting. Um, and it basically is centering around concepts that relate to mental health, emotional regulation, um, their decision making, things of that nature. So I think what we need to be aware of is that.

There are components of social and emotional learning that impact these individual's growth. The first piece of it is self-awareness. When you think about adolescents, how self-aware are they actually, you know, they may be self-centered sometimes, but some of them are self-aware and there are ways that we can assist in fostering their self-awareness.

Bringing things to their attention and having them sit with it and have a conversation about it helps to increase their self-awareness. And so how do we ensure. That we are tapping into how self-aware they are or are not, so that we can make sure that they get that concept down. Because if you're not self-aware, then a lot of the things that follow you don't know how to prevent because you didn't know that it was a problem to begin with.

Right. So self-awareness is, is really key when it comes to this population. Then their ability to self, ability to self-regulate and self-manage. Just think about adults. We can see now in our current climate, uh, politically and just what's going on in all the different facets of, of the world. People are having problems with self-regulation.

They're, they're not able to manage themselves, and so. We obviously are not setting a great example for our youth that are seeing the things that are going on in the media and around them, um, sometimes in their own schools, in their own cities. Um, and so. Being able to assist them with understanding how to regulate their emotions, how to, uh, calm down, how to handle difficult situations, uh, is important to their growth.

And so being able to help them connect this to their growth is important. It's one thing to, to understand I'm angry and I'm, I'm gonna punch something, but it's another thing to understand, Hey, I'm angry and I wanna punch something. But when I think about what the. Something or someone for that matter.

But when I think about the consequences that may be associated with me not managing my emotions and my behaviors, maybe I'll make a different decision. And then just pulling in that career piece, being able to tie in, Hey, you need to learn how to do this now because get, if you get upset on a job. Um, and you punch something or something that could cost you your job.

And so helping them tie all of that stuff together is important and it helps to foster their growth. , , some other areas our decision making. We don't make the best decisions as adults. You know, I can tie all of this stuff into, I really could have done a presentation on at-risk adults, to be honest, because we've got a lot of social and emotional learning that we could do as adults.

But I think if we start tackling these things. When they're younger and having some early intervention, then we'll see more self-regulated adults and adults that are able to manage emotionally and behaviorally and make responsible decisions. And so, um, those are just some of the areas. Relationship skills is another area of social and emotional learning.

So thinking about, , there's so much engagement in technology when it comes to texting and things of that nature that we find that, you know, the youth of today are not really as sociable as. I was, when I was growing up. I, I used to, we didn't have all of the technology so I had to socialize.

But you know, I think helping them to understand how to build those relationship skills outside of the new technology is also, uh, important in fostering that growth, , as well. A hundred percent. And I'm really glad that you mentioned social emotional learning and. Highlighted that for our listeners, because I think there's still so much confusion about what social emotional learning actually is, and only if we understood it more can we really appreciate how essential that is for working with our youth, especially in career counseling.

Tell us listeners a little bit more about that. What are the career counseling bits of this that are important to know as well in terms of working with at risk and how does Insta Growth tie into that? So when I think about growth, , from a career perspective and a social and emotional learning perspective, I think partnering the two together is a perfect blend to aid in the growth of, of the youth understanding those, .

I guess what we would identify as soft skills that students need to have when it comes to moving into a, uh, work environment or a higher, a higher education setting. Um, I, I look at that as the social and emotional learning piece, and then the career piece of it is in the academic side of it and, and being able to marry the two.

So, one piece of career that is. So dear to my heart are the theories, um, and being able to tie those theories into the work that's being done with these youth. So looking at two of the developmental theories are super and godson. Uh, they're very well known for their, um. Discussion of development of youth particularly, and so super and godson both focus on the fact that youth are thinking about careers much earlier in life than we give them credit for.

We start looking at stuff at high school. And I'm not saying that all schools do this, but I just general, a general thought process is by high school, we need to be talking to 'em about what kind of career they want, what they wanna major in, where they wanna go to college. We need to be talking to A-C-T-S-A-T, whatever.

Those are the times when we need to be talking about this. But the truth of the matter is they're thinking about it well before we start the conversation. And so if they're thinking about. Careers and they're also having these social and emotional learning issues. If we take the career component and help them understand how the social and emotional learning issues may be, may impact them as they want to move into these certain careers, then hopefully we can address the behaviors that we're seeing.

Earlier so that they can move into the careers that they're looking to move into. So an example could be a student having behavior problems or academic issues. Um, look, using these theories, we can help them see, hey, Guyon says, Hey, let's look at where you are and where you're trying to get to and let's use some understanding of circumscription and, and, uh, creation and.

How does your self image fit into that? You wanna be a business owner. How are you carrying yourself now that will get you to being that business owner? Are you showing up on time for class? If you're not showing up on time for class? How do, if you and you don't show up on time for your business, what do you think that's going to look like?

So helping to shift behaviors by helping them see. What those behaviors look like for them as they get into the workforce, I think is important. Because again, they're already thinking about being in the workforce. They wanna be successful, they wanna make money, and that is their thought process. The rest of this stuff is just, I gotta get through it 'cause I'm trying to get to the money.

And so in order to get to the money. You need to understand that not only do you have to take these academic steps, but you also have to take these steps to ensure that your social and emotional learning is intact as well. So those are the, a couple of the theories that focus on really digging into social and emotional learning.

There's also the, um, cognitive information processing system that fo uh. Not system, but theory that focuses on decision making. So we just talked about they may not always make the best decisions, so how can we help them see how the decision making that they're having now could impact them as they move forward, not only in their academics, but also into the career path that they're interested in.

So I just am a forward thinker when it comes to. Working with the youth, because I understand they won't be youth long. I was a youth at one point, and I'm no longer a youth, so I understand that they need to be prepared for the world that is ahead of them. And so the best way that I think that we can prepare or one of the best ways, is to help them zoom in on what they wanna be and how their behaviors and academics fit into what they wanna be.

So that's how that career piece ties in for me as a career consultant. , My focus is always going to be how can I pull a career in? So, , this is one of the ways and, and former experience and current experience as a counselor educator and mental health counseling, , being able to tap into those behaviors and mental health issues that may also be contributing to, , their lack of growth.

So. So how does the Insta Growth thing work? Tell us about that. How does Insta growth work? So like the idea of it like Insta Growth, what is the biggest takeaway, I think, from this idea that you feel like, that we feel like maybe listeners can take with them and implement?

So I would say the biggest takeaway, if I had to sum up the presentation in maybe three points, I would say that, , the first thing is. How we see these youth, um, impacts their growth. And so in order for us to see this insta growth or this, this dynamic of, Hey, I want to grow and help me figure out how to grow.

In order for us to get that dynamic going with our youth, we've got to first check ourselves. Uh, we talk about social and emotional learning and one, one piece of that being self-awareness. And so the first part of this is checking ourselves. To make sure that we are not contributing to some of the things that are causing these students to be at risk.

And once we check ourselves and make sure that we are in a place to help them grow, then we pull in these other factors of understanding what social and emotional learning truly is and the different components of it. And then being able to help the students tie in how important it is to. Tackle these issues that they may be having presently so that they can move into the areas that they truly want to move into to be successful.

And sometimes it may not be just them, them tackling it, but it also may be us advocating for them to get the resources that they need so they can tackle it. Because I will go back to my, one of my initial statements. Students generally aren't re are. Are not at risk because they've chosen to be, they're at risk because of their circumstances.

And so sometimes we may have to assist them in addressing circumstances in order to be able to remove that at risk label and for them to really be able to move into being successful. So it's, it's trifold in. In looking at how we see them and our own self-awareness, encouraging and, uh, empowering them in their space to want success and to do what it takes to be successful.

And then advocating for what is necessary on our end to ensure that we can remove as many barriers as possible for them to get to success and to grow. So ultimately that is the picture of growth. And, you know, I feel embarrassed a little bit because this is all like so amazing and part of my brain was like, where is this app?

How does this app work? Like, do you see yourself making an app for this that maybe can be helpful to career counselors as as sort of like a possibility because I would so live for this app, Dr. Gore Fitzsimmons, you trying to make me work. But no, that's a great idea. It's not something that I've asked.

Absolutely thought about. Um, but I have, I do the workshops right now with the schools, but as you are, as you're bringing that up, you know, it's definitely an idea that I, I may toy around with, I am not the best at technology, but as I'm working with these youth, maybe I can pull some of them in. In this process of Insta growth, maybe I can pull some of them in to assist me in my practice and help with the formation of an app. I haven't thought of that, but you're pushing me outside of my comfort zone and I like it. Honestly, it would be so amazing. So I really do hope that, you know, you build on that.

'cause I could see that really taking off, just like you know, the topic at hand. Absolutely blew my mind and blew the mind of the attendees, you know, at the symposium, just because of the fact that it was, it was such a catchy way to draw us in to the phenomenon that gets so overlooked. When it comes to at-risk students, I think one of the biggest things that you highlighted as we sort of summarize our time a little bit here is that it's almost taboo to work with at-risk students.

Like because of the stigma with at risk and the idea of it. It's almost as if we attribute moral failing somehow to. Their status and we ignore them because of that and stay clear in a, in a really awful way sometimes. And so part of that for you is reframing the way we look at at risk students and understand that any of our students can be at risk because of their circumstance.

For sure. Absolutely. Yeah. I think you summed it up perfectly. So we can't be looking down on at-risk students, y'all, we cannot be doing that. That is out of the question. Okay. We do not do that and we should not be doing it. If we are, um, maintaining our NCDA ethics, that is something that we should not, that's what I saying.

Yes. Uh, well, Dr. Barnes, Gwen, you know, thank you so much for taking the time to share this with us, you know, and share with us this new, innovative approach. On how we look at at-risk students and how we can use career counseling and social emotional learning to support them. So thank you, uh, so much for your time and, let's do this again sometime.

Absolutely. Thank you. You have been an amazing host, so I appreciate you being willing to sit and talk with me about something that I'm so passionate about, and it's so true to my heart. So thank you for your time and for having me. All right.