The Marvelous Ms. Chaplin

Whenever you pass by Room D153, you might notice a teacher standing at the door, talking enthusiastically with her students, other teachers, security guards, or administrators. If you bop your head in that classroom during lunch, you’ll see many students hanging out with this teacher or with each other. This teacher is Ms. Chaplin, who teaches various business classes here at Blake.

I’d always seen Ms. Chaplin outside of her classroom, but she seemed intimidating to me at first. Now that I’m a part of her Entrepreneurship class, I understand why students are drawn to her – her enthusiasm for teaching and snarky humor make people feel at ease, including me.

One thing many students don’t know about Ms. Chaplin, however, is that she’s a successful entrepreneur. She runs a therapy business, Chaplin Counseling and Consulting, when she’s not teaching at Blake. I decided to interview Ms. Chaplin to learn more about her business and how it operates.

Ms. Chaplin started Chaplin Counseling and Consulting because she “felt [she] could help people in the world.” However, she didn’t imagine herself opening a business at first.

“[My] original goal was to be a school counselor because I hadn’t been exposed to people who owned their own businesses, and once I discovered that was an option for me, I shifted course and decided that I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I went through my master’s program, … got my national certification, … earned my state certification, and immediately started my practice.”

Ms. Chaplin credits “the grace of God” for the success of Chaplin Counseling and Consulting, noting, “I don’t think I’m that great and wonderful. I think that it really is God working through me to … [help] people … be successful.”

Ms. Chaplin devotes around 15 hours a week to her business but has no employees. So what happens when she’s teaching here at Blake?

“My business hours are in the evenings and on Saturdays, and my clients all know that I teach full-time, so … if they need me, they know they can reach out to me in the evenings. They know that if they have an emergency, … I am not the therapist they [should] reach out to, but [since] I … don’t have any … clients [with serious mental health issues] … it works.”

Ms. Chaplin adds that to balance operating Chaplin Counseling and Consulting and being a teacher, she has “to be very conscious [of] and focused on [her] health and taking care of [herself].”

“I do a lot of self-care. I know how my body feels, … so when it’s time for me to lie down and go to sleep, I lie down and go to sleep. That is critical … [along with] eating healthy, exercising, [and] doing … things to take care of yourself, … [especially] when you have such a busy schedule.” 

Ms. Chaplin’s favorite part of running her business is “helping people,” which seems to be her calling.

“Fun fact: my [first] name, Sandy, means ‘helper of mankind,’ which … my parents [didn’t] know when they named me. It’s something I discovered in my late 20s, [but] it’s … always been who I am.”

All in all, Ms. Chaplin is both an excellent teacher and a successful entrepreneur. All of her students, and all Blake students in general, can learn a lot from her life inside and outside the classroom.