International Handbook for Policy Research on School-Based Counseling by John C. Carey Belinda Harris Sang Min Lee & Oyaziwo Aluede

Author:John C. Carey, Belinda Harris, Sang Min Lee & Oyaziwo Aluede
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

Conclusion

Going by the above submissions, there is no doubt that if the canons of provision for the school-based counselling go unchecked, there is bound to be some consequences which could be summed up as follows:

Presently, there is a lack of trained counsellors to provide the needed school-based counselling within African schools, particularly for the regions of Eastern and Southern Africa. Therefore, there is an urgent need to train qualified guidance and counselling personnel to fill in the gap of lack of trained personnel to supply the demand for school-based counsellors. Otherwise, school-based counselling might be left in the hands of untrained professionals which in the long run will militate against the quality of counselling services at the school-based level. What this means is that the provision of counselling services might continue to be left in the hands of subject teachers who are not only untrained but are also bothered by the burden of teaching their various subjects alongside serving as counsellors for which they have little or no expertise. It is not an exaggeration to say that without adequate training, there will continue to be lack of efficacy among school-based counsellors, which is very much needed for valued provision of services (Atici, 2014). Therefore, the provision of appropriate counselling training is a prerequisite for professional counselling at the school-based counselling. Consequently, Ministries of Education and NGOs and all stakeholders need to make rigorous effort to ensure that counsellors who serve at the school-level are adequately trained.

Similarly, there is a need for instituting monitoring and evaluation of counselling programme at the school-based level. Basically, such evaluative structure should be multilevel, both within the school internal sphere and at the ministerial level including monitoring that comes from professional association level. The essence is to ensure that counselling services are provided within the peripheral of the required policy and ethical considerations. In this way, school-based counselling will adhere to guiding policies within the region of operation.

In addition, the monitoring and evaluation process had to include the operations of a licensure body that ought to grant further certification to school-based counsellors within the region. It does not mean that there will be one licensure body for the whole region but each country in the region ought to institute its own licensure process. It is essential that quality is maintained through this independent examination body, particularly as counselling in this region is still in its formative years. Hence, it is a prerequisite that excellence is upheld by observing counselling principles and ethics.

To achieve much of these requirements, money is needed. It means that provision of counselling services at the school-based level is capital intensive , including resources for in-service training, provision of office equipment and books, etc. Particularly, within African context, adequate resources are needed for research and publication, in order to stimulate the African emerging counsellor to be involved and committed. In this way, the school-based counselling services will be sustained. In addition, resources are needed for ongoing evaluation and policy implementations.

To sum up,

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.