Amy Johannesen is a certified school counselor in her 5th year working for the Lewiston Independent School District.   For 4 years she served as a counselor at Centennial and McGhee Elementary Schools, both in Lewiston, and she is currently the full time counselor at Centennial.   A native of Kansas, Amy grew up in a small rural farming community, one of 47 students in her high school’s graduating class.  She received a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Colorado College in 1994, and a master’s degree in Counseling Psychology from the University of Denver in 1996.   She is an LPC in Idaho, an LMHC in Washington, and is an ASCA Trauma and Crisis Specialist.

She began her career working in community mental health and non-profit agencies as an adult day treatment therapist, outpatient therapist, sexual assault therapist, and triage clinician in Alabama and Washington states.  She took a hiatus from professional work while her children were young and her family had multiple military moves.  She remained active in community service organizations and routinely volunteered at her children’s schools.  It was while assisting in her daughter’s 4^th grade classroom that the teacher encouraged her to apply for a substitute teaching position with the Lewiston school district.  After working as a substitute teacher for a year, Amy returned to her counseling roots in a position as a therapist with a small counseling agency, but found that she missed working in the collective environment of the schools.  In 2015, she accepted a position as an intervention tutor at Sacajawea Junior High School while obtaining the additional educational requirements to be certified as a school counselor through the online School Counseling Program at the University of North Dakota.  She was hired as an elementary counselor at Centennial and McGhee Elementary Schools in 2016.   The current principal at Centennial is the same 4^th grade teacher that encouraged her to try substitute teaching seven years ago.

Developing a data driven school counseling program has allowed Amy to advocate for the needs of her students and promote the positive impact school counselors have on the academic, social/emotional, and college/career needs of students.   Amy has helped spearhead family movie nights to increase parent engagement, advocated for professional development so counselors could offer parenting training to caregivers of district elementary students, presented to the school board about the benefits of the ASCA national model, secured several grants to purchase small group counseling curriculum and fund whole school and family engagement activities, provided professional development training to district and school staff on bullying prevention, confidentiality, and mindfulness, and served as a mentor and provided ASCA model training for new district elementary counselors. 

Outside of school, Amy spends her time moonlighting as a substitute ballet instructor, hiking with her husband, digging in the dirt in the garden, cooking, and enjoying game nights with her family.