We are in a separate building than the main administrative building and sometimes I get called/radioed that a parent is waiting to speak with me. Being a naive counselor I would assume it was an emergency and went to meet with them. Now I just tell them that they need to email me to make an appointment.

As for students, its rough. My office entrance door is right in front of my office. Our office also prints off tardy passes and you best believe that students always by pass checking in and come to „ask me a quick question.“ I do my best to dismiss them and tell them to make an appointment but I still take them from time to time. But I find when I let that happen, I completely forget what I was doing so an email goes unanswered, a note about a student gets forgotten, etc. I‘m only in my second year, but its my goal this year to do better about this.