Toward a hypothesised role of the school counsellor (Pt 2)

Dear Editor,
Education and training of the school counsellor: the expectation is that school counsellors complete a 60-credit master’s degree reflective of three years of full-time graduate studies integrating theory, practicum and skills culminating in a terminal internship.
This integrated knowledge of theory, practicum and skills form the foundation for empathy, client observation skills, client interviewing skills, assessment of person and environment and the application of positive techniques toward problem solving, growth and change in goal outcome.
Theory in counselling may take two parts: a) the same theories of counselling – psychodynamic, humanistic, behavioural, cognitive etc that psychotherapists take, but not with the same depth and practicum b) the theories of vocational development for career counselling is the main preparation for school counsellors, reason for which their real job title in the schools is denominated guidance counsellor, to differentiate from other kinds of counsellors in a clinical setting such as addiction counsellor, alcoholism counsellor, rehabilitation counsellor etc.
Emphasis of the school counsellor training is placed on career and life planning and academic progress of students. Their training in testing, for example, is in personality testing, achievement testing, interest testing and aptitude testing to match personality traits with job characteristics for vocational choice and long-term career and life planning, quite unlike clinical testing for diagnosis of mental illness by clinicians.
Counselling is a process of interpersonal change and the quality of the relationship with the client will determine the desired behavioural outcome. Based on the education and training above, school counsellors should not be given licenses to encourage independent practice, but should remain within pedagogical certification.
Observation on education and training: Cultural Awareness: The communication style, emotional style (behaviour and attitude), learning/thinking style of students is the result of socialisation with family, extended family, neighbourhood, community, school years, and vicarious experiences that form their internalised core values, beliefs and traditions that make up the worldview of clients.
This socialisation of the client that takes place in a multiracial, multi-ethnic, multicultural society can render the above glamorous education and training of the counsellor deficient unless the counsellor has been trained within this multiculturally centred sensitivity of worldviews. For example, the counsellor may be an expert emphasising a Eurocentric world view or values but end up in a blaming the victim outcome, alienating the client and making the entire process counterproductive.
The glamorous education and training of the counsellor above can certainly come with deficiencies and quality supervision and relevant staff development can ameliorate this shortcoming. It will certainly take a culture centred counsellor to accurately assess the level of enculturation of clients as he/she is trained in the racial, ethnic, cultural identity theories of development as part of cross-cultural psychology.
Over individualising the counselling process excluding environmental variables of socialisation may hamper the resocialisation necessary to provide the client with the resources to cope with complex environmental stressors.
Other duties of the counsellor:  In addition to above, counsellors are expected to provide academic counselling, personal counselling, career counselling, test taking strategies, parent skills training, information on community resources for referral, teacher and administration consultation, gender diversity consultation (controversial), attend suspension hearings etc. Further, he/she can take on the role of teacher trainee, monitor each student’s progress, be a liaison to other agencies in the community, serve as a referral resource, be the crisis coordinator in such issues as the death of a student, teacher, trauma in the community, grief counselling, dealing with conflict resolution with students, with opposing gangs, assess issues of depression, anxiety, suicidality, child abuse or other mental health issues to be assessed in the safety of confidentiality with appropriate intervention.
At the level of programmatic counselling, group counselling can take the form of topics in adjustment groups for new students, study skills, homework skills, building reading skills, conflict resolution, filling out job applications, job interview rehearsing, mediation training, racial awareness groups, interracial communication groups, or simply unstructured groups to develop an appropriate emotional response style. The group approach is best to reach most students, but unstructured groups is also recommended to teach emotional skills. Overall, the role of the counsellor should be autonomous and free of administrative interference and politisation.

Beyond the counsellor’s role:  The school counsellor is a professional helping to optimise the cognitive, emotional and social self-actualisation of the client in a healthy academic environment, not a classroom teacher or an administrator; obviously, the counselling function currently carried out by the untrained, the uneducated and the unprepared in counsellor education can do more harm than good. At a higher level of training than the school counsellor in clinical skills are the school social worker and the school psychologist.
These three professionals belong to what is known as the school pupil personnel team. The school social worker is trained to work with students to do short term therapy and work with families as the learning interference may derive from the home environment. Referrals to the social worker are made by school counsellor who consults with the social worker on a regular basis.
The school social worker is trained to work in intervention strategies with teachers in the individualised modification of instructional strategies and classroom curriculum to solve the learning problem before referral for a comprehensive assessment by the school psychologist with whom the school worker forms a higher-level intervention team. The school psychologist is not only trained to do cognitive, academic, emotional and social assessment for the diagnosis of learning disabilities, but also to write up specialised instructional programmes to address the needs of the learning disabilities diagnosed.
He is a consummate school-based mental health professional. Some of these recommendations resulting from the comprehensive assessment may involve services from a list of additional professionals beyond classroom teachers such as reading and speech teachers to address speech and articulation disorders, physical therapists to address orthopaedic problems, occupational therapists to address activities of daily living in terms of fine and gross motor skills, or even a nurse if medication is to be given during school hours.
School transportation and home services may also be recommended. These services may seem farfetched and unrealistic, but the goal is to ensure the success of all children, that no child is left behind, that learning disabilities are identified and addressed and that all children are educated to the maximum extent possible in general education, while receiving all necessary support services to level the learning environment. Of course, these levels of support may be inaccessible at this time, but serve to present a map of the continuum of services within the school system.
Supervision: Obviously, current administrators may not have the training to supervise counsellors and provide the necessary growth and staff development for this class of pupil personnel professional. The qualified person can be appointed by region and meetings can rotate by schools and professionals can service more than one school. Since counsellors are not classroom teachers, teaching is not affected. The issue of the number of students under the caseload of each counsellor is a relevant for organisation, but the challenge for a new kind of educational leadership with this innovation is obvious.
Conclusion: This cursory exploration highlights the school counsellor as an ally and advocate for students, parents, teachers and the entire educational community in optimising learning in a healthy academic environment and offers an added opportunity for quality home-school relationships for higher student achievement in all areas.
This new culture centred professional with a non-evaluative, non-judgmental style of communicating factuality without blame brings a new model of emotional understanding to guide student life and serve to motivate the maximum development of potential toward self-actualisation. Other professionals mentioned as team members for other areas of students’ needs remain a challenge for the logistics of educational organisation and leadership.
To the unschooled in the organisation of student support services, this may sound farfetched, but the future road map is clear. To continue to deny, dilute, and distort the reality of educational needs remains a disservice. Quality pupil personnel support services for a quality education in the formation of authentic values of future citizens helps create a stable democracy – a future open to change and opportunity.

Sincerely,
Dr Udayram Ramharack (Psychologist)