Reversing guidance cuts would be a good move

The recently published ESRI report, ‘Leaving School in Ireland: A Study of Post-School Transitions’, highlights the critical importance of the career guidance service in a student’s journey through second-level school and beyond.

This study found that students place a very high value on one-to-one sessions with their school’s career guidance counsellor and that this was seen as a key factor in their satisfaction with overall guidance provision.

Students felt that generic group guidance activities were a poor substitute for the personal interaction of one-to-one meetings and did not reflect their individual needs and aspirations.

Unfortunately, since 2012, in a series of short-sighted cuts, the guidance and counselling service provided to our second-level students has been decimated.

One recent study by the Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland (ASTI) found that over 70 % of schools have had to reduce the provision of one-to-one guidance counselling for students and that almost a third of schools have been forced to abandon one-to-one sessions completely. This comes at a time when teachers are reporting that increased numbers of students are manifesting stress-related symptoms such as negative behaviour, and disengagement.

Reducing the already meagre resources available to young people at a time when they have greatest need for them makes little educational or economic sense and will most likely prove more costly in the long term.

The appointment of Jan O’Sullivan as minister for education and skills provides a welcome opportunity to undo some of the damage done in the recent past. Reversing the swingeing cuts to the guidance provision would be a good first step.

Kevin P McCarthy MSc, HDE

Killarney

Co Kerry