Guidance Department
A comprehensive Guidance and Counselling service is available to all students at Castleknock College. The Guidance Department offers students one to one counselling and careers advice service in an attempt to assist pupils making choices about their lives in three key areas: (1) Personal, (2) Educational and (3) Careers.
The Guidance programme aims to:
- Overcome any information deficit on careers/education.
- Foster a sense of personal responsibility for identifying future educational/vocational goals.
- Provide experiences that promote career development and prepare students for the transition to work/higher education.
- Focus on an individual’s strength and potential so as to create a strategy for promoting discussion around the student’s educational/careers/personal development in order to discourage irresponsible action.
- Introduce and foster a process of evaluating realistically, attainable personal/career/educational goals.
- Encourage the pupil to define expectations.
Personal Counselling:
(Please scroll down for links from Tusla, updated 1st March 2021)
The Guidance Counsellor is available for personal counselling to pupil’s who may be in difficulty or crisis. Individual counselling is available to all students on request and/or referral. Personal counselling is a learning process concerned with addressing specific issues, making decisions and forming positive action plans in order to tackle the issue in question. This is achieved through supportive listening and accurate reflecting in an environment which attempts to promote the pupil’s self-esteem and self-knowledge. Sometimes it is easier to talk to someone about a problem who is not directly involved as they can offer non-biased advice and listen with clarity.
- This service is here to help pupils make decisions and to allow them to declare and accept dilemmas, and to assist pupils in developing an action plan in order to progress.
- It is important to note that the Guidance Counsellor is not there to judge an individual but to help one explore issues that may be causing concern in order to promote both self-esteem and self-knowledge.
- The Guidance Counsellor will endeavour to develop pupil’s strengths and pinpoint things that may halt progress.
- Counselling can generate self-awareness and develop personal freedom/responsibility and create a positive self-identity.
- Counselling focuses on what one is doing and thinking in order to change how one is feeling.
- The Guidance Counsellor is here to Listen, Accept, Respect, Understand and Respond.
Educational/Careers Counselling:
Educational/Vocational counselling assists the pupil to grow in self-knowledge and self-esteem by providing information to enable them to make constructive life choices and future plans. Armed with the information pupils are then free and responsible for their own choices and actions. The Guidance Counsellor helps the pupils to recognise the range of alternatives available after completing the Leaving Certificate and assists them to develop the skills to consciously shape their own career path.
- The Guidance Counsellor will provide pupils with information and assist in any way possible with various choices. However, The Guidance Counsellor will not make decisions for pupils.
- Vocational Counselling helps pupils to recognise a range of alternatives and assists them to develop skills to consciously shape their career path. It aims to overcome the information deficit on careers and educational opportunities. It also fosters a sense of personal responsibility for identifying future educational and career goals.
- Information in class and individual consultation is there for pupils to think and act upon their future and to discourage irresponsible action. It helps one to evaluate realistically, attainable career and Higher Education goals.
- I am here to assist, but pupils must take the responsibility to participate fully in both the research and decision making process around their future career paths. Students have a vast range of choice in relation to career and educational opportunities, but, with choice come responsibility and the consequences of making certain choices.
Assessment:
The Guidance Counsellor avails of a range of Psychometric tests to discover the most effective way to meet the needs of the students and in order to identify their aptitudes and interests. The following are the main functions of the tests which the Guidance Counsellor offers:
- Prediction of academic performance.
- Assessment of behaviour.
- Educational/career planning.
- Assist with decision making.
- Help evaluate if pupil’s goals are realistic.
Constructive feedback helps the student to choose effectively a life/career path and they are then allowed the freedom and responsibility to assimilate new information and consequently empowered to make educated and pertinent decisions.
Useful Links
You can contact the Guidance Department by:
- E-mail: Guidance@castleknockcollege.ie
- Phone: 01 821 3051, select Option 4 at the menu.