Dr. Heidi Larson currently works as a Professor in Eastern's Department of Counseling and Higher Education. Her recent teaching experiences include; Professional Orientation, Basic Counseling Skills, Group Counseling (a specialty), Internship and Family Counseling. Additionally, she provides clinical supervision, professional consultation, and training for master's level counselors. Dr. Larson has over a decade of clinical and research experience to aid in the application of her pedagogy. She has dedicated four of those years specifically to researching test anxiety and its treatment. Her work has been published in Time, the Journal of School Counseling, and Pastoral Counseling, interviewed and featured on Eastern’s university-wide podcast and has won awards such as the Graduate School Research/Creative Activity Grant, the Achievement and Contribution Award in Teaching, the 2013 King-Mertz Award of Excellence in the College of Education, Mentor of the Year Award, TRIO Department, the Provost Graduate Assistant, and the 2017 Luis Clay Mendez Distinguished Service Award.

Dr. Larson actively facilitates students' learning experience by guiding and mentoring students in state and national conferences and research fairs devoted to spotlighting students' achievements and hard work. She has helped implement and maintain the successful B.I.O.N.I.C. (Believe It Or Not I Care) mentoring program at Mattoon High School for the past five years. Her work on student mentoring has been published in US News & World Report. She has facilitated an integrated learning environment for students to complete a thesis, obtain and provide clinical supervision to their peers, as well as work together in publishing research articles and literature reviews. Dr. Larson currently serves as a School Counseling Graduate Coordinator.