School counseling is one of the most critical yet underutilized resources in our educational setup. More often than not, counseling services are evoked when the students’ psychological well-being is threatened.
However, school counseling sessions are a magical bullet that, when properly used, could avert many social and psychological problems the student fraternity faces. It is essential to appreciate the role of school counseling in enhancing student behavior, attendance, academic performance, and social development.
Recognizing the importance of school counseling sessions, most educational facilities want more counselors, but are we getting the most out of the school counseling sessions? Do students optimally gain from the process.
These are some of the hard questions we have to face to ensure that we maximize the impact of school counseling sessions on the student’s well-being. Below are five best practices to get the most out of school counseling sessions. Take a look!
1. Incorporate School Counselling Sessions at Elementary Levels
There is an underlying misconception that counselors react to problems. As such, students at elementary school have more minor issues, thus negating the need for counseling sessions. This cannot be true! elementary school counseling is designed to be proactive in helping students to deal with day-to-day challenges and distractions in their learning process. In fact, elementary school counseling is an effective preventive measure for thwarting the threat before it blossoms into ungovernable stages. Therefore, nurturing the culture of elementary school counseling comes in handy in helping young students to understand the educational environment and how to cope with it.
Unfortunately, elementary teachers frequently underutilize or misunderstand the role of elementary school counseling. Most do not embrace the counterbalancing role of elementary school counseling and often see it as a quasi-administrative position. They must appreciate how important it is for students to see someone on their side; otherwise, they will feel like the whole system is ganging up on them.
2. Make School Counseling Sessions Central to Schooling
Often, schools have been deemed as institutions for honing the students’ academic prowess. This means priority is given to developing academic talent, which should not be the case. Academic excellence is multi-dimensional, and creating a wholesome student takes much more than just mastery in classwork. Moreover, it is critical to recognize that the educational environment is prone to external disturbances.
Therefore, counseling should not be a luxury but an integral pillar within the schooling system to make schools effective and supportive. Constantly advise students to seek counseling services whenever they need to speak to someone outside the administrative apparatus of the school.
3. Hire Counselors With Specific Roles
Many schools tend to hire counselors to increase accessibility to school counseling services without caring about the quality of the service. In most incidences, schools hire counselors with unclear defined roles. This ambiguity often leads to a situation where the counselors’ efforts are diverted to handling tasks outside their central obligation.
For instance, counselors find themselves stepping in for teachers or invigilating exams instead of attending to students’ psychological, academic, and social needs. This is one problem that has been disturbing the profession since its inception. As much as hiring counselors is essential, schools need to specify the scope of counselors’ roles if they are to maximize the impact of counseling on students’ well-being.
4. Foster Collaboration With other Departments
Student counseling, as a department, cannot singularly achieve its objective without effective collaboration from other departments. To get the most out of school counseling sessions, there must be a deliberate sense of cooperation with other departments. The teaching fraternity, parents, and the community at large must collaborate with the counseling department to create wholesome students.
The logic of effective collaboration is based on the fact that students interact differently with different departments during their stay at school. For instance, a student may perform exemplary in sports but not in academics. Thus, it is crucial to understand why they are performing in one faculty and not the other. This can only be achieved by working closely with those directly interacting with the student in the different departments.
Therefore, collaboration with other departments gives the counselors an in-depth perspective of the students, thus enabling them to render tailor-made solutions to students.
5. Getting Feedback
For a school counselor, getting feedback is one of the last stages of the counseling process. It could be last but not least in significance. Getting feedback from the student is more of a follow-up process on the previous sessions with the student.
Additionally, feedback could be obtained from different quarters. For instance, teachers and parents may give feedback on the student’s progress after counseling. To the counselor, the feedback hints at what should be deployed to maximize the gains of the process.
Furthermore, it offers an opportunity for the student to set new goals. Therefore, getting feedback is critical in informing the following steps to be taken by the counselors in the subsequent sessions, thus maximizing the output of the counseling sessions.
Even the best academic environments cannot horn an all-around student due to external factors. Counseling offers an avenue for students to square out any distractions they encounter during their educational journey. However, the availability of counseling services alone does not guarantee quality. Follow the above-highlighted ideas to get the most out of school counseling sessions.
Parting Shot
Even the best academic environments cannot horn an all-around student due to external factors. Counseling offers an avenue for students to square out any distractions they encounter during their educational journey. However, the availability of counseling services alone does not guarantee quality. Follow the above-highlighted ideas to get the most out of school counseling sessions.