The School-Based Counselling Primer

For students beginning to think about their future in the workplace, a school-based counselling post is likely to be a popular consideration. Policy agendas and funding streams indicate an increased commitment to the mental health of our young people, and the school setting is an obvious place to meet those needs. This Counselling Primer is the first introductory text on school-based counselling. Written by Dr Katie McArthur, and with a foreword by Mick Cooper, The School-Based Counselling Primer presents the findings of current research in the UK with implications for school-based counselling practice.

Every major political party has declared its belief in the importance of school-based counselling to the wellbeing of children and young people, both in the here and now and in the future, in supporting their continuing mental wellbeing and resilience through adulthood, parenthood and into old age. In this unique book, based on her own experience as a school counsellor and her extensive research with children and young people, Kate McArthur explains how school-based counselling works, why it works, what it can offer the individual child, their family, their school and the wider community, and the difference it can make – from the perspectives of the children and young people who have benefitted from it themselves.

In Wales and Northern Ireland all secondary schools are required to provide an independent counselling service. Having read this book, you have to wonder why this isn’t the case in England and Scotland too. In the words of Mick Cooper, Professor of Counselling Psychology at Roehampton University and a key player in making the case for counselling to be available in every secondary school (and whose foreword introduces the book): ‘My hope is that we are moving towards a world in which children and young people can feel less ashamed and hidden in their mental health struggles.  The monsters may never be entirely overcome, but at least children and young people do not need to be alone with them.’

This is a book for student and experienced counsellors alike; you will be inspired by its contents. But it is also a book for school heads and governors, for those with the power to make school counselling a reality for every child and young person in the UK’s education system.