Decrease in school counselling will see escalation in psychiatric problems

CHANGES to the way guidance counsellors are allocated in post-primary schools could result in greater numbers of young people presenting at psychiatric outpatient clinics, it was claimed this week.

Guidance counsellor positions in post-primary schools will now have to come from the school’s overall allocation of teachers, a move that the Teachers’ Union of Ireland described as a “disaster”.
“It was a bit of a shock, that guidance teachers are going to be cut. They were ex quota, that meant they were outside your timetable. This change means they have to be put on the timetable but the guidance teacher is usually a trained counsellor and there is usually one in every school, dealing with kids aged 12 to 18 helping them with their career choices and their CAO choices and so on and while maybe some of that can be done in a class, that isn’t the case for it all. There are students with special needs, students with dyslexia perhaps and there are programmes designed specifically with these students in mind but you wouldn’t pick out a student in a class and say they might be suitable for programme X or Y. That has to be done in private,” said Shannon teacher and president of the TUI, Bernie Ruane. This will hit disadvantaged children whose families don’t have the money to pay for a private consultation with a career guidance professional outside of school hours.
Students experiencing difficulties will also be negatively impacted by the change.
“Career guidance teachers are often qualified counsellors and provide other services like pastoral care. These are turbulent years and teenagers often need high levels of support. A lot of homes are having employment shortages for the first time and this is affecting these kids and it is important that counsellors would have time to talk to them,” Ms Ruane continued.
Dr Moosajee Bhamjee, retired consultant psychiatrist, has said he fears a decrease in counselling in schools will mean problems will escalate.
“There is still a major shortage of talking therapy,” Dr Bhamjee said, adding “we need the Government to provide more psychologists and counsellors and I am quite concerned now the Minister for Education has taken away the school councillors. You had kids who were experiencing difficulties who up to now, you could send to the guidance counsellor but that will be soon gone. That creates a problem because the difficulties the children are having might be small, so perhaps there is no need to come to psychiatric out-patient clinics. I am talking about problems like the break-ups, the bullying and so on, the problems that if we caught them early the young people might have better outcomes,” he concluded.