School Psychological Counseling

Mrs Phuong Hoai Nga, Master of Psychology (University of Toulouse II-le Mirail, France) shared the priorities of psychological counseling at The Olympia Schools, as well as the school’s methodology in promoting the effectiveness of school psychological counseling.

Prevention is Better than Cure.
She said that, at The Olympia Schools, beside teaching, students’ school life is also taken care of. Therefore, we have prioritized the establishment of the School psychology department.

Alongside with other educational activities, the School psychology department aims to create a safe environment, motivate and support students at different levels: individuals, groups, school.
At school level, our department contributes in building, developing and launching prevention programs. At group level, there are group supporting activities for each problem from students. At individual level, in-depth interventions are carried out and suitable for individual problems.

“At The Olympia Schools, school psychological counseling activities are effective due to the active support of the school's Executive Board. Owing to that, our department’s activities are synchronously implemented and receive cooperation from teachers, parents, especially students.
School psychology department is developing following the school’s development.

"At the present, there are School psychological counseling at every level of education."
-- Master Phuong Hoai Nga

“In most students' activities, there is always the presence and contribution of our department. Until now, the majority of students, parents and teachers can feel that they are fully supported when working with School psychology department – said Mrs Phuong Hoai Nga

Before mentioning students supporting progress, Mrs. Phuong Hoai Nga assumes that the most important aspect is professional ethics, in which the fundamental principles are students’ information confidentiality, students’ consent and their rights.

The number 1 priority of School psychological counseling at The Olympia Schools is to implement prevention programs through education, with the most evident activities are lessons about emotional-social skills, integration in learning and extracurricular activities, especially synchronous implementation of school’s own culture.

Regarding supporting individual issues, at the beginning of every school year, the School Psychology Department conducts screening activity based on psychological evaluation tools. Screening data together with proposing information from teachers and parents will help our staff make a list of students that need supporting, have difficulties in some aspect such as emotion, behavior, relations, perception, etc.

After that, with the allowance of parents, students in this list will undergo further evaluation through observation, clinical interviews and sometimes through in-depth psychological tests at school or other independent units. The result will help our staff identify the priority level of each matter and determine appropriate form of support.

“When it is decided that a student needs personal counseling, he/she will be arranged with a fixed counseling time every week. Besides, our counselor will also coordinate with teachers and parents to decide the most suitable method for that student in different circumstances. The counselor will evaluate the progress of that student periodically.
Personal counseling will finish when the evaluation result shows the positive progress of students.

"Even when the counseling finishes, contact between student and counselor will still be maintained for any further requirements."
-- Mrs Phuong Hoai Nga shared.

Our goal

Mrs Phuong Hoai Nga claims that the important role of school psychological counseling was recognized by many educators in the world, especially in the countries with advanced education since the goal of this activity is to create the most favourable learning environment for children by promoting the connection between school and family.

In Vietnam, our educational target is to bring about balanced development for children, with support from school psychological counseling. Therefore, it would be helpful for students when this activity is implemented.
"There are some fundamental elements which are important to implement any activity: social demand, human resource and facilities. In Vietnam, many educational institutions have already deployed the school psychological counseling.

The elements I have mentioned are fundamental for a methodical implementation. We should be careful, because one, or may be all of those elements can be missed.

The article was published in the Education Times on September 26, 2017. See details at the linkhttps://goo.gl/n7Sd57