Can Counseling Help?

School counselors used to mean someone who talked to students about what college they should go to, but it is slowly becoming something more. School counselors are now people that students visit to talk about some of the problems they may be facing in their daily lives. This is especially true with children who live in neighborhoods like the one mentioned in the book “There are No Children Here.”

                        Children in these rough neighborhoods face a lot of violence and see things that most children and most people do not see. Counselors in these schools have the special task of being someone that these students can talk to about these issues. The counselors are also there to help the children work through some of their problems.  When Craig died Lafayette had a very hard time dealing with his emotions about losing his friend. If they had a good school counselor, he might have had someone to talk freely to about the way he was feeling without feeling judged.  He would have had someone, with an unbiased opinion, to help him work through his emotions.

A little background about what counselors are supposed to do. I am taking a counseling class right now and one of the things I have learned is that some clients may have a hard time talking about how they are feeling, especially if it was a horrific experience. Sometimes a client just needs to sit in silence and think about what has happened and it can be exactly what they needed. My teacher had a client come in and every session she did not talk and my teacher just sat in silence with her. After the last session the girl came up to her and said the silence was what she needed, she just needed a place to go through what had happened in her head. Also, as I said in class, counselors may have to draw out the emotions from their clients in order to help them work through them. it is a long difficult process but in the end it is completely worth it. The most important thing a counselor has to do is to be a non-judgemental person. No matter what the person has done or who they have been in the past, we cannot judge them. When it comes to being a good counselor you have to think that everyone is a good person.

           

These kids also need someone that is going to help them in their academics. They have the same mental capacity as any other child and have talents and gifts too. It would help if they had someone who will always be on their side and push them to do their best in school. If you always have someone telling you that you can do something and supporting you, you are going to want to do better. They can also help these kids find good scholarship and help them apply for FAFSAs to help pay for college. Pharaoh was a good example of a child who was really smart and he ended up succeeding in school, but some kids do not have that kind of drive. The children in these neighborhoods deserve the same chances in life that every other child gets. They deserve a chance to be successful too.

            

While school counselors may not help solve all of the problems in these neighborhoods, they do help. If we had more counselors in these schools than I feel like we could see a significant change in the outcome of these situations. It really is true that one person can make a big difference.

https://www.schoolcounselor.org

http://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/high-school-notes/2015/02/02/3-ways-high-school-counselors-can-help-students-parents