Guidance Counsellors

The role of Guidance Counsellors is to provide counselling, student support, classroom support and assessment services to assist students in our Catholic schools.

Students may be referred for brief intervention either individually or via small groups, to assist with a range of challenges such as social skills, emotional regulation strategies and grief and loss.

Students may also be referred for psycho-educational assessment. Access to assessment and classroom support requires teacher and classroom planning, intervention and monitoring before proceeding. 

Students in secondary schools can self-refer, or be referred via their pastoral leader, member of their Leadership Team or parents. 

Support provided by Guidance Counsellors is not a replacement for psychological therapies and students requiring intensive support should be referred to a private psychologist or alternatively to one of the publicly available services.

Conversations with Guidance Counsellors are typically confidential, however there are circumstances in which matters cannot be kept confidential (E.g. student safety/self-harm/child abuse or neglect) and in those cases information may need to be provided to a Parent/School Principal/Child Safety.  Guidance Counsellors will discuss with parents and students the limits to confidentiality during the consent process prior to commencing counselling. 

Please see here for access to the Guidance Counsellors in Secondary Schools brochure.

To make an appointment with a Guidance Counsellor, students can self-refer through the Student Portal or alternatively present at the Health Hub and request an appointment.

Prior to making a referral, please note the following:

• If the matter is urgent call 000 or alternatively go immediately to the Emergency Department of your local hospital
• Guidance Counsellors are only available during school hours and term times
• A doctor’s referral is not needed to make an appointment with a private psychologist, however with a doctor’s referral fees will be significantly reduced
• Additional support is freely available from the following organisations:

  https://kidshelpline.com.au/	1800 551 800 (24/7)
  https://www.13yarn.org.au/	13 92 76 (24/7)
  https://headspace.org.au/	1800 650 890
  https://parentline.com.au/	1300 30 1300
  https://www.lifeline.org.au/	13 11 14 (24/7)