Teens face ‘huge loss’ of beloved counsellors
Students expect ‘service gap’ after mental-health agency leaves all but two city schools
They’re cosy drop-in spots in a handful of Toronto high schools with counsellors trained to mend the teenage soul.
But Delisle Youth Services is pulling its beloved mental-health counsellors out of all but two schools this fall because of funding changes, it says, leaving hundreds of students distraught at losing the trusted outside agency.
“It’s a crime to take away this resource for students — I’m a completely different person because of the help I got from (Delisle counsellor) Angela (Ebenau),” said Grade 12 student Mark Stephens of North Toronto Collegiate, who said school guidance counsellors aren’t trained to do long-term personal counselling.
Delisle has run counselling offices for more than a decade in several Toronto District School Board high schools — North Toronto, Northern, Lawrence Park, Vaughan Road Academy, York Memorial and the City Adult Learning Centre (known as CALC).
But earlier this spring Delisle notified the TDSB it was closing all but two — the offices in Northern and CALC — which came as a shock to North Toronto Principal Joel Goren-koff.
“This is a huge loss; Angela has touched the lives of 100 kids this year alone about everything from eating disorders and housing issues to general school issues and some very serious personal problems,” said Goren-koff.
“Mental-health issues have grown exponentially, so without this external resource I’m not sure we can support students as well.”
Delisle officials said the Ontario government partly funds the agency and has shifted its funding emphasis more toward students with intensive need. As a result, Delisle will switch counsellors from the five high schools to special “Section 23” classrooms in settings such as group homes. The agency also cited less successful fundraising drives as putting it on weaker financial footing.
“This is not a decision we made lightly,” said Filomena D’Andrea, Delisle’s director of clinical and community services. “We’re a very small organization and we’ve had to do a lot of thinking about how to allocate our dwindling resources.”
A North Toronto school newspaper report by Grade12 student Jack Den- ton — dubbed “Delislegate” — cited rumors that the TDSB’s own unionized youth counsellors had nudged the agency out — a charge union president Olga De Melo denied.
“We welcome outside agencies; there’s more than enough work to go around,” said De Melo, president of the Professional Student Services Personnel.
Likewise, Marcia Powers-Dunlop, the board’s interim senior manager of professional support services, said there was no move to replace Delisle’s counsellors with board social workers, even though the TDSB’s new focus on mental health and wellbeing has brought funding for some mental-health nurses.
“I was quite surprised that Delisle is leaving,” she said. “I’m sorry they’re going.” At Vaughan Road Academy, more than 300 students have signed a petition to save Delisle counsellor Kirsti Conway, to whom Grade 12 student Nancy Truong turned when the stresses of life started to “eat away at me. And I felt so much better.
“There’s going to be a service gap now and we deserve answers.”
As North Toronto Grade 12 student Morgan Stockwell heads to university this fall, she credits Delisle’s counsellor with helping her gain the confidence to even think of post-secondary.
“I can’t imagine my Grade 9 self walking into North Toronto in September without the Delisle counsellor.”