36 new school counsellors for divisions
Thirty-six new counsellors will be deployed, either this month or next month, at different divisions around country to serve as school counsellors. This was confirmed by the Minister for Education, Heritage and Arts Rosy Akbar during the 24th Head Teachers Association Annual conference at the FMF Gymnasium yesterday.
“We have a great shortage of counsellors and I know that it affects your work,” she said.
“But I am told that by August or September we have 36 new counselors coming out and they will be posted in the divisions.
“At the moment we are not in a position to give you one counsellor per school but they will be based in the divisions and so please utilise the services.”
The counsellors complete their courses from local counselling organisations like Empower Pacific
and Medical Services Pacific (MSP).
With the theme ‘Educational Leaders for Sustainability’, school heads were expected to raise their concerns for better leadership during the three-day conference. She urged school heads for more responsibility to be taken concerning the increase in requests of free textbooks.
“Free text books have cost us FJ$14 million since 2014,” she said. “At the moment we are finding that because we are giving out textbooks to students there seems to be very little responsibility taken by parents and students. Year-in-andyear-out we get the same requests.
“The question is where did the books go? You only request for more if student numbers rise.” The ministry is working closely with the Curriculum Advisory Services on improving such matters.