Maine School Counselor
Maine school counselors work with students from pre-K through 12th grade. The state projects about 130 job openings a year from 2024 to 2034, and the May 2025 median wage is $58,630. Maine Certificate 075: School Counselor has multiple pathways, including a conditional certificate. Two CACREP-accredited programs in Maine offer the degree.
Maine Links
Maine’s school counselors work with students at every grade level. One week that might mean helping a seventh grader manage test anxiety, guiding a high school junior through college applications, and connecting a family in crisis with outside support. It’s practical, demanding, and consequential work.
What School Counselors Do in Maine
The Maine Department of Education publishes its own Maine-specific Comprehensive School Counseling Program model, which sits alongside the ASCA National Model, the framework the American School Counselor Association uses to run school counseling programs. In practice, that framework plays out differently at each grade level.
At the elementary level, a counselor might lead classroom lessons on conflict resolution or help a student who’s been pulling away from friends get back on track. At the high school level, the focus shifts. Picture a hypothetical student: Marcus, a junior in Bangor, is the first in his family to think seriously about college. He meets with his counselor to identify programs that fit his interest in environmental science, what financial aid options might be available for his family, and which application deadlines he can’t miss. That’s a single meeting, and it covers a lot of ground.
Maine counselors also provide short-term individual counseling and coordinate referrals when a student needs longer-term support. In the 2025 Maine Integrated Youth Health Survey, about 13 percent of Maine high school students said they had seriously considered suicide in the past year. That’s down from about 18 percent in 2023, a real improvement, but it still means Maine high school counselors should expect to work with students in crisis. The mental health side of this job isn’t secondary. It’s part of the work every week.
Data matters here, too. Counselors track patterns across their caseload, flag students who may be struggling before a crisis develops, and work with teachers and administrators to build systems that catch kids early. The goal is a schoolwide program, not just one-on-one appointments.
To work as a school counselor in a Maine public school, you’ll need Maine Certificate 075: School Counselor. The Maine Department of Education offers more than one pathway, including a conditional certificate for candidates still completing their preparation, and our certification page breaks down each one.
Job Outlook in Maine
Maine projects about 130 openings a year for school counselors and related educational and guidance counselors from 2024 to 2034. Most of those come from replacement demand: counselors retiring, changing roles, or leaving the field. Total employment is projected to dip by about 40 jobs over the same period, a 2.1 percent decline. Nationally, the same 2024-2034 projection shows 3.5 percent growth.
So if you’re searching for guidance counselor jobs in Maine, expect a market driven by turnover rather than expansion. Openings come up as positions turn over, and they won’t always be in the part of the state where you live. Being open to rural districts, or to a role that covers more than one school, can widen your options. The Maine Center for Workforce Research and Information publishes the state’s projections if you want to dig into the detail.
School Counselor Salary in Maine
The May 2025 Maine school counselor salary median is $58,630 a year, below the national median of $64,330. These figures cover the federal category for educational, guidance, and career counselors and advisors, which includes some workers outside K-12 schools, such as college advisors.
| Percentile | Annual Salary |
|---|---|
| 10th | $45,300 |
| 25th | $49,270 |
| Median (50th) | $58,630 |
| 75th | $74,330 |
| 90th | $82,460 |
| Metro Area | Median Salary |
|---|---|
| Portland-South Portland, ME | $61,130 |
| Lewiston-Auburn, ME | $59,500 |
| Southwest Maine (nonmetropolitan area) | $57,780 |
| Northeast Maine (nonmetropolitan area) | $56,040 |
| Bangor, ME | $51,670 |
Portland-South Portland has the highest median among the five Maine areas shown, and Lewiston-Auburn sits just above the state figure. Bangor has the lowest median among the five Maine areas shown.
CACREP-Accredited School Counseling Programs in Maine
Two universities in Maine offer a CACREP-accredited school counseling master’s. The table orders programs by size, not quality, and only one of the two reports graduates under the federal code we use, so the table has one row.
| Institution | City | Degree | Accredited Through | Master’s Graduates (2023) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| University of Southern Maine | Gorham | M.S. | October 31, 2027 | 39 |
Husson University in Bangor is also CACREP-accredited, through October 31, 2031. It does not report graduates under the federal code used here, so it is listed separately rather than placed in the size order. CACREP confirms that Husson delivers its program online.
The University of Southern Maine’s CACREP status is Accredited (Reaffirmation in Process), and its current accreditation cycle ends October 31, 2027.
CACREP accreditation does not automatically establish eligibility for Maine school counselor certification. Confirm that the program meets Maine DOE requirements before enrolling.
How this table was built. Every program here is accredited by CACREP as a School Counseling program, verified against the CACREP register on September 30, 2026. Any program whose CACREP status shows a teach-out, closure, show-cause or withdrawal is excluded, because a reader cannot reliably enroll in it. Programs are ordered by the number of master’s graduates each university reported to the federal IPEDS survey for 2023 under CIP code 13.1101, which measures size, not quality. That count covers the whole university, so a school running more than one school counseling master’s reports them together, and a low count can mean some graduates are reported under a different code. Treat the order as a rough guide to size rather than a ranking. Where a university reports no graduates under that code we name it below the table rather than place it in the order. CACREP accreditation is not the same as state approval: check the Maine requirements for school counselor certification before you enroll.
How Maine’s school funding law counts counselors
Maine’s school funding formula, Essential Programs and Services, uses a student-to-guidance-staff ratio of 350:1 in elementary and middle schools and 250:1 in high schools, under 20-A M.R.S. §15679 as of October 2026. In districts with fewer than 1,200 students, those ratios are reduced by 10 percent, giving small, rural systems a little more counseling time. The formula sets what the state counts toward a district’s costs, not how many counselors a district must hire, so actual caseloads vary from one district to the next.
- Openings come from turnover: Maine projects about 130 openings a year from 2024 to 2034, even as total jobs dip 2.1 percent.
- Varied day-to-day work: Counselors support students academically, socially, and emotionally, from elementary classroom lessons through the college application process.
- Pay depends on region: The May 2025 state median is $58,630, and Portland-South Portland is highest among the Maine areas shown at $61,130.
- Two accredited programs: The University of Southern Maine in Gorham and Husson University in Bangor both hold CACREP accreditation for school counseling.
Thinking about school counseling in Maine? Our step-by-step guide covers the graduate program, the supervised internship, and the 075 certificate.
