It’s More Than a “Buzz Word”: How Australian School Counsellors Use Trauma-Informed Practices and What Is Needed for Effective Implementation

School counsellors are widely recognised as having the expertise and skills to implement trauma-informed practices, and to do so effectively means implementing such practices at the whole school level. This study was informed by the ecological model of professional school counselling, in which 11 metropolitan, urban, rural, and remote Australian school counsellors were interviewed to identify their experiences and what they see as important for the effective implementation of trauma-informed practices. Findings establish the importance of intentional collaboration between principal and school counsellor, and for principals to prioritise both trauma-informed practices as a whole school approach, and provide leadership opportunities for school counsellors to implement trauma-informed practices. While trauma-informed practice has become a “buzzword” in education, these insights from school counsellors themselves add substantial knowledge to the body of literature on the effective implementation of trauma-informed practices in schools.