There are plentiful measures that a school counselor could apply in an attempt to create a more secure and more positive school atmosphere as well as facilitate in a lessening of the amount of violence taking place in the learning institution context. School counselors may inhibit violence in learning institutions through taking proactive measures, for instance by being greatly available and visible to staff and students, which facilitates the school counselor to establish relationships with everybody in the school setting (Bray, 2016).
As a consequence of the exceedingly high portion of culprits struggling with loss and grief, bullying, anger management, depression, poor self-confidence, in addition to poor problem-solving abilities, there is a necessity for and justification for imminent counselors to oversee the counseling groups handling these issues in the hope of granting these learners the instruments they have need of to cope with their emotions more positively.
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Survey has proven that a number of attackers are bullied for an extended span of time. Accordingly, it would be useful for a counselor to facilitate teams dealing with the incidence and outcome of bullying. A counselor might coach a learner various tactics that they could employ to lessen bullying, including journaling, negative enquiry (that, is differing with what the oppressor is demanding), fogging (vocally assenting with the tormenter), assertiveness schooling (employing the ‘I’ messages), and setting SMART goals with the intention of restructuring the focus from being the target of bullying to feeling capable and being responsible for their lives by accomplishing goals (Studer & Mynatt, 2015). Guiding bullying prevention teams could aid a learner to feel better regarding themselves and coach them not to placate damaging opinions, which consecutively will assist in the creation of a safer, more wide-ranging school atmosphere and hopefully minimize revengeful activities, for instance, school firing.
Moreover, specialists declare that about ninety-eight percent of culprits combat a deep personal loss prior to the attack and lack apposite coping abilities to deal with the loss. Accordingly, in an attempt to lower school violence, counselors should facilitate grief and loss squads in educating students the healthier approaches to management of their emotions like exercise, expressing their feelings, employing art or music therapy, composing letters, regulating feelings, journaling, and during the occurrence of death, conversing how to appreciate and carry on a person’s legacy rather than being self-detrimental and presenting toxic conducts.
What’s more, a majority of culprits have poor self-esteem as a consequence of being preys of bullying or lacking various pro-social contacts, along with exhibiting ineffective conflict resolution abilities (Kub & Feldman, 2015). Therefore, it would be beneficial for a counselor to address matters relating to self-esteem on top of conflict resolution in order to facilitate students who struggle with these difficulties to enhance their self-image, train them to accept as well as love themselves, stress the importance of positive declarations, coach learners to express in preference to suppress destructive observations, and motivate learners to discover their strong point along with positive attributes in order to improve their internal resources so that they can realize their goals.
The American School Counselor Association trusts that the counselors ought to be leaders in implementing and developing school safety policies prior to, during and following a calamity. Also, counselors can facilitate conflict resolution groups, which are beneficial in educating learners on the manner in which to resolve issues, minimize social hostility linked to low school affection, and conquer disputes with other students through the use of a non-quarrelsome and nonviolent manner, through peer arbitration, using clear and direct communication, and solving problems vocally as opposed to using bodily violence.
Conclusion
In a nutshell, the figures about the sizeable rise of violence in the learning institution context are staggering and alarming. Learning institutions have been established to be protected havens for learners along with faculty, wherein everybody could feel protected and work in an atmosphere which is advantageous to learning. Following violent actions, confidence and security are usually compromised, leaving faculty and students feeling overpowered and devastated. Therefore, in an attempt to ensure the wellbeing of faculty and every learner, a school counselor has a vital and exceptional role of ensuring that each and every learner is effective personally, emotionally, educationally, as well as socially. It is therefore important that a counselor operating collaboratively with learners, their relatives, educators, along with community groups detect a learner who is experiencing extreme emotional suffering and offer them the assistance necessary to prevent potential school violence.
References
American School Counselor Association. (2013). The School Counselor and Safe Schools and Crisis Response. Retrieved from https://www.schoolcounselor.org/asca/media/asca/PositionStatements/PS_SafeSchools.pdf
Bray, B. (2016). The counselor’s role in ensuring school safety - Counseling Today. Retrieved from https://ct.counseling.org/2016/08/counselors-role-ensuring-school-safety/#
Burgess, A., Regehr, C., & Roberts, A. (2010). Victimology: Theories and applications . Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Juan, S. C., & Hemenway, D. (2017). From depression to youth school gun carrying in America: Social connectedness may help break the link. Cogent social sciences , 3 (1), 1314877.
Kub, J., & Feldman, M. A. (2015). Bullying prevention: A call for collaborative efforts between school nurses and school psychologists. Psychology in the Schools , 52 (7), 658-671.
Studer, J. R., & Mynatt, B. S. (2015). Bullying prevention in middle schools: a collaborative approach: collaborative, proactive anti-bullying interventions and policies that strive to create and sustain a safe environment for all adolescents. Middle School Journal , 46 (3), 25-32.
Uzunboylu, H., Baglama, B., Kucuktamer, T., & Kuimova, M. V. (2017). Opinions of school counselors about bullying in Turkish high schools. Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal , 45 (6), 1043-1055.
