The Importance and Impact of Providing Counseling Services in Schools - Essay Example

? Counseling in Schools Counseling in Schools Counseling can be defined as the provision of services for pupils with emotional, behavioral and social difficulties, and special educational need. There was a rapid expansion of counseling in schools during the 1960s followed by a subsequent decline (Ajmal and Rees, 2001). This was a response to the Newsom report that recommended school counselors. Universities introduced special courses for practitioners, which accelerated this growth in the 1970s. However, lack of coordination, lack of monitoring, and failure of embedding counseling in the school culture led to a decline in school counseling in the 1980s and 1990s. The British government increased education funds from 60 million pounds in 1951 to 436 million in 1964 and supported child-centered education (Bor, Ebner-Landy, Gill and Brace, 2002). The 1960s were marked with the lifting of individual behavior constraints and the toleration of personal idiosyncrasies. Suicides, drugs, and sexual relationships caused many casualties in early 1960s, many under 25 years. This led to the proposal to provide secondary school students all the help they could get. One way of providing this help was the introduction of school counselors. The Schools Council formed in 1964 represented teachers in policy-making forums and promoting educational development (De Board, 1999). Recent studies have shown its resurgence as a non-stigmatization emotional support among pupils. The enactment of the Children Act in 2004 and the reshaping of children services give a prominent future for counseling (Cooper, 2009). Counseling services in schools are growing rapidly on a local demand-led basis. Sources of counseling include school counselors, contract agencies such as Relate, and educational psychology referral services provided by LEA. Guidance from professional associations is not mandatory due to lack of a statutory base for counseling. The current restructuring of counseling provides new structures that can be challenging. Counselors have to provide therapeutic confidentiality through information protocols, shift towards multi-agency teams, and redefine their professional boundaries. School counselors provide therapeutic individual counseling that is distinct from other form s of support such as mentoring. Counseling is provided through several formats such as external counselors, members of teaching staff, or an external agency (Egan, 2002). Counseling provides pupils with an access to appropriate confidential service that has beneficial personal outcomes such as improved mental health. Students experience mental pressure after bereavement, bullying, family breakup, and peer rejection. Counseling, especially by external counselors, provides an avenue for relieving mental pressure. These students eventually exhibit positive outcomes in education, behavior, and social and organizational activities. This helps them to enhance their social well being in the school. Confidentiality encourages students to open up to counselors and discuss personal matters that they may not discuss with parents or teachers. Solving individual problems helps enhance student self-esteem and improves their emotional well being. Counseling services are funded from the internal school budgets and provide students with a cost effective service for dealing with their personal difficulties. Schools hire individual external counselors, counseling firms, or utilize members of the teaching staff. This eliminates the need of visiting expensive counselors for students in need of counseling services. Schools provide the necessary funds and provide comprehensive support services. The school management has control of the counseling process and provides the overall direction for individual counselors and other pastoral support services. Previous research has shown that young people value having other people to turn to who include school counselors. Although several young people experience mental health problems, only a small percentage is referred to specialist mental health therapists. School counselors handle the larger percentage of mental disturbance cases (McLaughlin, 1995). Providing counseling services in schools normalizes service provision and enables the provision of treatment that extends beyond the clinical setting. Counseling in schools creates closer ties between students and counselors. This makes it possible to assess student problems, and the recovery process is assessed more accurately. This closeness makes it possible to tackle problems before they become pathological issue; thus counselors carry out preventive duties. Students, especially boys, undergo a lot of stigmatization from the society and the school community and counselors play a major role in their recovery process. School counselors, part-time or permanent, provide these students with a guaranteed source of help. A study conducted in the UK using the TEEN CORE questionnaire indicated that school counseling was very effective. Female students had more self referred sessions than male students (Fox and Butler, 2009). Male students recorded more teacher referred sessions. The study revealed that students who underwent counseling sessions were less disturbed than those who had never attended any session. Follow up assessment after three months indicated a significant difference between students who underwent counseling sessions and those who did not. This study revealed that therapy sessions in schools were efficient in solving student mental disturbances. Studies have shown that pupils have always wanted a chance to share problems especially school-related problems. Teachers have limited time to devote to students, and they tend to under rate the support they can offer. This creates a necessity for permanent or part-time school counselors who have enough time to interact and help pupils. Students spend most of their time in school and one-to-one counseling services provide a platform to articulate their problems. These sessions enable students discuss issues such bullying, school issues, and risky behavior that are most common in schools (Geldard and Geldard, 2008). Students also get an opportunity to discuss home issues that they might not discuss with their parents. Many students have expressed difficulties when talking to their parents or relatives, and it is easier to talk to counselors in school. It is particularly difficult to discuss personal and embarrassing issues with parents. Parents may disapprove some issues expressed by their children, and students usually refrain from talking to them. Several students find it difficult to talk to friends about personal problems to avoid social exclusion and for confidentiality reasons (Fox and Butler, 2007). School counselors provide an alternative to students, who can discuss even personal problems with them. The need for confidentiality causes several students to shy away from discussing personal problems with friends or teachers. One requirement of counselors is to keep patient information confidential. It is unethical for counselors to discuss the student’s personal information with teachers or parents. This assurance encourages students to open up their personal struggles to school counselors. One of the main benefits of school counseling is the availability of someone else to turn to and discuss personal problems. Counselors face several challenges when engaging with students during the counseling sessions. The role of the counselor can be defined precisely or remain open and vague. Education systems and school setup differ from each other and counselors may be allocated different roles. In some schools, counselors perform other roles such as student admissions and referral to other schools or institutions. Role clarity determines the counselors’ perception of the counseling program. In several societies, school counselors are faced with role ambiguity and have to incorporate several activities within their schedule. Carrying out several roles within the school increases their workload leading to reduced efficiency. Defining expected counselor duties and how they are supposed to deliver services are part of challenges faced by counselors (McLeod, 2003). Students avoid counselors who perform administrative duties and manage school affairs. Student perceptions determine the success of counseling programs in schools. Students have a tendency of classifying counselors as either approachable or unapproachable. Counselors deemed approachable are visited more frequently and have the opportunity of providing help to more students. Counselors are supposed to effectively manage student perceptions in order to encourage them to seek counseling services. Familiarity with the school counselor is essential for encouraging students to seek counseling services. In several instances, students are more reluctant to share their problems with strangers (Lang, 1999). This is more common in schools which employ individual counselors or contract external firms. Pupils are more comfortable when discussing their problems with teachers or parents. This is due to familiarity that exists between the two parties. External counselors need to participate in school activities that familiarize them with students. Engaging in club, sporting, and educational activities familiarize students to counselors. This makes them feel more comfortable when sharing their problems and increases their frequency of seeking counseling services (Low, 2009). Students in some schools are unaware of counseling services or where and when to access such services. In a study conducted in UK schools, some students were unfamiliar with counseling programs in the school. They expressed their willingness to attend therapy sessions but had no idea of the program. The school management may use posters to advertise for counseling services and when to access them. Some students are ignorant to such messages and remain unfamiliar with the counseling services offered (Robinson, 1996). Counseling requires confidentiality and a quiet environment, and the offices may be located in areas with limited accessibility. This reduces the number of students familiar with counseling services and the location of counselors. Most schools in the UK have part-time counselors, who visit the school about two times a week. Due to the large number of students, their sessions are fully booked, and students may spend up to three weeks before attending counseling sessions. Counseling sessions are allocated limited time and counselors attend to few clients in a week. Students may have urgent problems that require visiting the counselor urgently. They have to look for alternative sources of help or hold onto their problems until they get the opportunity of seeing a counselor. Students seeking counseling services face mockery from peers, especially for boys. Attending counseling services is viewed as a form of weakness for men and many may stay away from counseling sessions. The traditional view of masculinity keeps male students away from seeking counselor help. Students attending counseling sessions due to bullying are likely to be bullied more. In several institutions, counseling rooms are located along busy corridors for easy accessibility by students. This makes it possible to identify students who attend counseling sessions. Bullying students who have been reported are likely to bully therapy patients more. Attending therapy sessions is viewed as a sign of problems by ordinary students. Individuals attending these sessions are considered to experience psychological problems, which are considered as an abnormality. They experience exclusion or discrimination from peers. This makes them avoid such sessions or prefer indirect contact with counselors or recommend the seclusion of counseling rooms (Tatar, 2001). Students propose the relocation of counseling rooms from busy corridors to secluded areas within the school. Counselors have to attend to different age groups and gender within the school community. Adolescents may shy away from visiting counselors due to different changes occurring in their bodies. Studies have shown that adolescent students rarely seek counseling due to a sense of maturity (Durrant, 1995). This makes them feel they can handle their problems without the assistance of counselors. Gender differences and body changes among adolescents creates the need for same sex counselors. Boys prefer male counselors while girls prefer female counselors. Students feel more comfortable when discussing their problems with same sex counselors compared to the opposite sex. Different age groups face different problems and the counselor has to handle every problem according to its gravity. Adolescents mainly face sexuality, drug use and self identity problems. Young children face group integration problems have little negative peer pressure. Counselors are faced with the challenge of conducting therapy sessions that match the requirements of each age group (Geldard and Geldard, 2009). Counselors access their clients through referrals by teachers or parents. The perception of school counseling and individual counselors by teachers is of great significance. Teachers participate in the school curriculum development and allocation of time slots for various activities in the school. The school curriculum heads allocate counseling sessions the required time. Negativity towards school counseling can lead to allocation of small time slots (Cooper, Hough, and Loynd, 2005). Education authorities set qualification standards for counselors, and the school management is responsible for hiring counseling services. Teachers involved in counseling activities have a more humanistic view towards the program compared to those less involved. Several studies have revealed that teachers believe the quality of counseling depends on the personality of the counselor. Teachers prefer counselors familiar with the school and the education system (Goodman, 1997). This determines their acceptance for counselors within the school. Their acceptance for school-based counseling is necessary for developing a sustainable counseling service. School counselors face the challenge of managing teachers’ perceptions and establish a balanced collaborative relationship (Greig, 2007). Information generated from counseling sessions is confidential, and counselors are not supposed to share that information with external parties. In some cases, teachers and parents may demand to access such information. Teachers view counseling sessions as advice-giving sessions, which do not necessitate confidentiality. This misconception of counseling creates a conflict between teachers and school counselors. Some teachers may consider counseling as inappropriate within the education environment and have negativity towards counselors. They fail to appreciate a counselor’s intervention in student problems and fail to understand the need for therapy sessions for pupils. Children might have faced certain problems for several years and, therefore, require long curing sessions. Some teachers feel they have the ability to wave a magic wand and provide pupil curing within a few sessions. Several teachers have accessed counseling through an external agency, and consider it to be an emergency service. Teachers holding senior pastoral posts feel threatened by the introduction of school counselors and may feel the need to participate directly or indirectly in therapy provision. This may include sharing client information against counselor ethics. Counselors have to balance the work environment with professional ethics, which is challenging (Barwick, 2000). The school community has a diversified student population. Some students require special attention due to psychological and physical challenges and students have different cultural backgrounds. School counselors are required to help develop programs that help challenged and disturbed students. This requires wide consultation with teachers and special units in other institutions. Challenged students are excluded from activities in the school and society, which causes stigmatization. Mentally challenged students have difficulties in learning and expressing themselves (Nelson-Jones, 2003). Counselors have to develop models that will help them express their problems comfortably. Students from foreign cultures experience several differences when integrating with the society. Immigrant students experience a language barrier and a change in the school environment. School counselors have to develop programs and models that help different clientele groups integrate with the school community. Counselors adopt theoretical approaches they are most comfortable with and are more skilled in. They mostly support eclectic approaches instead of psychoanalytic and behavioral approaches. The needs and characteristics of school clientele groups determine the type of approach adopted. Counselors classify teenagers into; drive oriented, intellectual-oriented, group-oriented, community-oriented and isolated. The counselor’s perception of the student groups determines their effectiveness in therapy sessions. These groups require different attention and different expectations when handling students contributes to different stressors experienced by teachers (Lines, 2006). Counselors lack formal supervision mechanisms, and they are supervised once or twice in a year. Regular supervision and discussion of work related difficulties is necessary to relieve counselors of work related stress. Counselors are confined to the school environment and have little contact and support from their peers and supervisors. Poor support and isolation causes professional inefficiency by counselors. Counselors and therapists have a code of ethics to follow when conducting counseling sessions. These ethics are also applicable to school counselors and are developed by BACP. They dictate roles associated with counseling and psychotherapy and infrastructure required for delivering these services. Counselors must be ethically mindful of their clients and hold accountability on an ethical basis of the practice. Counselors must support and respond to differences in abilities, needs, and cultures of their clients. A counselor must take into consideration variations between settings and service specifications by considering values, principles, and moral qualities. Practitioners are expected to obey human rights and dignity. This includes the Children Act enacted in 2004. According to this act, every child should receive equal treatment and confidentiality is required when sharing therapeutic information (DfES, 2004). The Local Education Authority provides centralized pupil referral services, which should be adhered to by counselors. LEAs have the obligation to safeguard and promote children welfare stated in the children Act. This obligation covers pupil health, drug use, bullying, and medical needs in schools. Counselors, teachers, LEAs, and schools have the responsibility of providing child protection (Jenkins and Polat, 2006). Professionals working with school children hold a commitment to maintain high levels of client confidentiality. This supports therapeutic alliance between the two parties and helps protect the well-being of the client. The Gillick principle gives young people below the age of 16 years the right to confidential medical and other forms of treatment. Counselors must promise confidentiality for shared information during the first therapy session (Pattison et al, 2007). Therapy professionals must provide exclusive confidentiality for client information and limit disclosure to interested parties. Within the school set up, parents, teachers, and managers may show interest in therapy session information. Counselors are prohibited from providing such information by the law, but teachers and parents may demand to know problems facing their children. Some information shared with counselors such as sexual abuse has to be reported to law enforcers as part of the child protection policy. The Sexual Offences Act of 2003 prohibits sexual activities with minors under the age of 16 years. Schools are expected to safeguard children rights by reporting illicit acts such as sexual abuse. Confidentiality is necessary to create therapeutic alliance, but counselors have to report risks of child abuse or sexual exploitation. The Children Act proposes the establishment of a child database to identify children at risk of sexual and child abuse. This type of information sharing will facilitate communication between different professionals providing children services. Sharing therapeutic client information on a national database is an infringement of client confidentiality and counselors can share information with the knowledge of the pupil. Counselors possess a strong professional identity due to their training and membership to a professional community. These attributes make counselors practice a role based professional approach with little integration with other professionals (Westbrook, Kennerley and Krik, 2007). The current educational system advocates for a multi-disciplinary team that requires therapists to work closely with other professionals. Improving pupil behavior requires coordination with teachers, educational psychologist, and mentors. However, professionals must hold integrity required by ethical standards set within their field of practice. A close relationship between parents is necessary for improving pupil behavior. Maintaining this relationship without disclosing confidential information is a dilemma for several counselors (Steward, 2000). Counselors are expected to practice fidelity or remain trustworthy as agreed upon by the pupil. Trust is required for understanding and ethical issues (Bond, 2009). Counselors must strive to ensure pupil requirements and expectations are met. This includes honoring their agreement, practicing confidentiality, and setting reasonable prospects for their pupils. Clients usually have personal problems and expect counselors to be trustworthy and practice confidentiality for shared information. Pupils and therapists may have certain agreements that have to be met in order to keep the therapeutic relationship. Therapists may have limited resources and tight schedules that may cause them fail to meet some of the client expectations. Counselors can practice make up sessions and follow up on pupil progression through phone calls and other activities. Clients have the right of self governance or autonomy over the development of different abilities within different aspects of life. Counselors must respect client autonomy and ensure accuracy of any advertised information and advanced services offered. Pupils are expected to provide or deny their consent regarding information provided. The counselor is expected to help pupils give free and well informed consent over any activities (Rogers, 1996). This consent is required during sharing of information with interested parties. Clients have to be informed of impending conflicts of interest in advance or soon after they occur. Manipulating clients against their will is forbidden, even when such manipulation provides beneficial social ends. Some pupils may be very young to make personal decisions and counselors may be tempted to intervene in such situations. Parents are supposed to provide protection for their children and have the right to know any activities engaged by their children. This may comprise client autonomy and counselors have to enlighten parents and teachers on client expectations stated by the law. The main objective for counseling is to promote the well-being of pupils and counselors have to ensure pupils achieve maximum benefits from these sessions. Counselors have to work strictly within their competence limits and provide services on the basis of their training and experience (Stallard, 2005). Systematic monitoring of pupils is necessary for achieving client interests. The counselor has to research and reflect before engaging in counseling services. Continuous professional development and regular supervision are necessary for enhancing the quality of services offered. Lack of immaturity by pupils may limit the obligation to work while upholding their best interest. Serious disturbance, stress, limited understanding, and other personal constraints may limit benefits acquired by pupils. Limited understanding and autonomy requires the involvement of teachers or parents. Counselors conduct parent training that aims at equipping parents with necessary skills that can help pupils after school hours. Fairness is required when offering counseling to pupils. Counselors have to respect human rights and treat all fairly. This requires considering legal obligations and requirements before engaging in therapy sessions and avoiding conflict between legal and ethical obligations. Impartiality is necessary when distributing services and allocating services between pupils. All pupils should have equal access to therapy services, which match their personal needs. Justice is also practiced by avoiding sexual, emotional, financial, or other forms of exploitation. Practitioners should avoid incompetence, malpractice, or providing services when unfit to do so. Counselors have ethical responsibilities of preventing pupil harm even when it is unavoidable or unintended. Counselors are also expected to question or challenge malpractices and incompetence of other professionals. This also includes engaging in investigations involving malpractices of other professionals. In some cases, counselors might be faced with problems that lie beyond their areas of expertise. This requires consultation or outsourcing professionals from other institutions experienced in that specific field. Counselor insurance guards against the failure to provide necessary services when sick or when faced with difficult personal circumstances. Personal integrity, empathy, sincerity, and respect are required from counselors. In some cases, counselors experience harsh treatment and disrespect from pupils, which may force them despise such clients. This compromises the ethical requirements for justice and fair treatment for all clients. Involving teachers in providing discipline to such students can solve this conflict. Counselors are required to assess personal strengths and weaknesses accurately. Personal attributes determine the learning capacity of pupils and counselors have to put into consideration such qualities during therapy sessions. Sound judgment is required from counselors when making recommendations regarding pupil behavior. Challenged pupils have several weaknesses and limitations to learning and self expressions. Counselors have to engineer models that help such students learn and express themselves. Counseling in schools is efficient in dealing with pupil problems and helps guide their behavior. Pupils get the chance to discuss their problems with another person other than their teachers, parents, or friends. Problem sharing helps them change their behavior and engage in more productive activities in the school and society. School counselors have to integrate with teachers, parents, and school administration during service delivery. The perception of counseling by teachers determines the success of these activities. Pupils feel more comfortable when dealing with familiar counselors, who are not involved in administrative activities. Familiarity with counselors and counseling programs determines the number of pupils who seek counseling services. Counselors are guided by professional ethics that govern their service delivery and relationships with pupils. Maintaining confidentiality, integrity, and trust are necessary for quality counseling services. References Ajmal, Y., and Rees, I. 2001. Solutions in Schools:Creative Applications of Solution Focused Brief Thinking with Young People and Adults. London: BT Press. Barwick, N. 2000.Clinical Counselling in Schools. London: Routledge. Bond, T. 2009. Standards and Ethics for Counselling in Action. London: Sage. Bor, R., Ebner-Landy, J., Gill, S., and Brace, C. 2002. Counselling in Schools. London: Sage. Cooper, M. 2009. 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