This paper discusses the role of the free clinic in helping youth. It examines the activities of the Health Emergency Aid Dispensary (HEAD) in New Orleans, a free clinic that: (1) performs pregnancy tests; syphillis and gonorrhea tests, urinalysis for kidney ailments, PAP smears; (2) prescribes birth control; and provides rapid consultation of a crisis-intervention nature through a 24-hour telephone-answering service. The log of a counseling graduate student from Louisiana State University who worked at HEAD to fulfill his practicum requirement provides an insight into the daily experiences encountered at HEAD. The log describes the orientation program, volunteer training, drug problems, venereal disease lectures, emergency telephone calls, and community requests for resource information. The paper concludes that working in such practical settings as HEAD broadens and deepens a counseling student's understanding of the real environment from which his prospective counselees will come. (Author/LAA)