8.1 Guidance and Counselling
In the course of their lives, people are faced with the need to make significant decisions that affect both themselves and those around them. For second level students, these choices are focused on three key areas:
a) personal and social;
b) educational;
c) career.
In second level schools, guidance and counselling may be broadly defined as the full range of interventions which assist students to make such choices about their lives. Guidance Counsellors, because of their specialist training, have a formal role in each of the main areas of guidance: personal and social, educational and career.
[Source : Guidelines for the Practice of Guidance and Counselling in Schools ‑- A report for the Minister for Education published by the Department of Education in association with the National Centre for Guidance in Education,. February 1996].
In each school there is a need for clarity in respect of the role of the Guidance Counsellor. This is particularly important in respect of confidentiality. Guidance Counsellors, especially because of their involvement in counselling individual students on personal, social or other matters, are in the way of learning about sensitive matters such as drug usage by students. There is a serious question if such information, although given under the assumption of confidentiality, can be withheld from the Principal or Deputy Principal. Clearly, there is an obligation to pass on to the relevant authority certain information, such as information on child abuse. In this regard, Guidance Counsellors and, indeed, all counsellors, should be careful about entering into contracts of absolute confidentiality with students.
It is recommended that the Board of Management, in consultation with the Principal, the Guidance Counsellor and the teaching staff, draw up a policy on confidentiality in the area of guidance and counselling.