A mental and physical health counselling programme is to come on stream at the Dominica State College (DSC) next year, college president Donald Peters has said.
He made the pronouncement Wednesday when staff and students of the DSC gathered in remembrance of Aldorah David, a former student of the college, who committed suicide at her family home in Massacre this month.
Peters said during the next year, the college will commit to reaching out to its students.
“For the next year we will put a lot of our resources in establishing both a mental and physical health counselling program. I have already talked to the powers that be and we are all on the same page,” he disclosed.
Stressing the need for reaching out to students, Peters noted that “27 percent of all students who come to college throughout the world have some level of dysfunctionality.”
The DSC head also encouraged members of the school body to look out for each other.
Well as a student I did not know that there was a counselor and my other colleagues are right the President does not really care for students in his golden pathfinder that he drives through the gate. I have been standing waiting for a bus and not once has he offered any of us a ride, a good chance to speak with us and find out our views, but then again maybe its not a good idea because when I mentioned it to other students they said that they had heard that he has a “reputation” and I did not want to seen with him. I must admit that we as students go through enough stress, home, financial school and we really have no one to talk to.
There is a counsellor at the college, in case Dr. Peters wasn’t aware. However, it is because dominicans have this ‘people aren’t confidential’ problem that no one chooses to recognise or remember that the college has a counsellor. There are people who can be confidential and professional and when the grown folks can recognise that, then the students will as well. Dr. Peters you are the president of the college and you should know that. State that there is a counsellor and further steps will be taken to encourage students to speak to the coounsellor; don’t make it look like one doesn’t exist at the college
thats certainly a great idea, i just hoping that it would really come through with the help and suuprt needed.
better late than never….
Good idea from the President of DSC. Every educational setting should provide students with counseling as an avenue for resolving issues, an objective person to talk to for getting to solutions. At the college level in particular, where students are facing so much stress both academically and personally, a counseling office is a necessity.
My recommendation is that a professional counselor be hired to meet the mental health needs of the students. Professional meaning someone with either a Master’s degree or Ph.D in a mental health field; i.e., psychology, clinical social work, counseling. This person must have the experience working in a mental health setting, and/or with students with emotional or adjustment problems. The person must be able to diagnose based on knowledge of the DSM IV, and have knowledge of psychopharmacology.
Anything less than this will only be putting a band aid on a serious issue. Students need as much support as they can get, and the tuition should be able to cover these services.
good move mr president. make it urgent.
As a DSC student I find it hard to believe that Mr. Peters actually cares. He drives to school in the morning and goes straight to his office….not once have I seen him mingle with students. Wondering if he knows what really goes on in the college……
but who is mr nuh?
i am a student an i didn evn kno we had all da….president wii hmmm…..rite now he jus playing his part….saying what he has to say…when he probably cudn care for n e thing other than his salry…
From the way you type I’m surprised you are in college. Not too surprised that you don’t even know the heads of the school. Backwards.
To the students and young people who thinks that suicide is a solution to your problem i just want to know thei:
SUICIDE IS A PERMANENT SOLUTION TO A TEMPORARY PROBLEM!!!!
Good effort but, i’ll go private
What we need to do like they said is look out for one another
I would have thought that something so basic was already in place. To reinforce my point, Peters noted that “27 percent of all students who come to college throughout the world have some level of dysfunctional.”, so that has already been established and we still have to wait a whole year again to put something so basic in place.
Peter wants to teach Lennox journalist and he really lacks basic managerial skills. I hope that Lennox will teach you, Peter managerial skills in exchange for you teaching him journalism.
mr ccountry …why are u attacking doctor peters? can you do better?
Good initiative!!
I trust that it will be implemented soon and that the students’ information will remain CONFIDENTIAL and that cousellors will not put out their information.
I admire the fact that the DSC has found it necessary to establish counselling for its students. My concern as always is that we are reactive rather than proactive. Why did we have to wait for tragedy to act? Mr. Peters you have acknowledged that 27% of the students have some form of dysfunctionlity. Most of these students are teenagers and young adults. In your studies I would hope that you would have known this is a very volatile age group and yes they need counselling.
With this said, I hope that you put this on the front burner. I would hope that you can get some outside help to maintain confidentiality because we know that Dominica has a problem with confidentiality. I wish you success in that endeavour and success in taking care of our youth.
Please get a clinical psychologist, they get very deep into the issues and offer serious therapy to those who need it.
There are many persons here with a first degree in psychology. It is very competitive to get into the Clinical Psychology field. At UWI in Mona there is a clinical psychology degree there at Masters and Doctorate level, please look into this affair.
Dominica State College and UWI are the academic blocks of our country. They have a moral and ethical responsibility to ensure that these issues plaguing our country are met. What do I mean? This means that they need to work at offering scholarships for students to pursue these fields which are readily need in our country.