Although they haven't taken the National Assessment exam yet, most of the 8th graders are already thinking about the high school they will attend. The plan was thought out ahead of time, and family and friends are the most important influencing factors in making the final decision.
It is natural, on the one hand, for mom and dad to have an important say, to be consulted in this regard, and for the child to take into account, first of all, their decision. On the other hand, however, we must not forget the extremely important role of school counselors who, based on comprehensive assessments, can recommend certain career directions to students. But, according to specialists in the system, this almost never happens, and the school counselor exists only in name, missing from this landscape completely.
Students choose their high school without taking into account the school counselor's recommendation. Photo source: archive
In recent years, we have witnessed a real phenomenon: many mediocre, eighth-grade children, encouraged by parents who overestimate them, end up enrolling in various theoretical high schools, and then have a disastrous academic career. We are talking about students with poor grades in the National Assessment and who, once admitted to a theoretical high school, can hardly cope with the high level and the requirements imposed by the teachers there. It is also the reason why some of them either go through school like a goose through water, or even drop out of school. They would rather have done at a vocational school, but while many are ashamed to learn a trade, others believe that those trades are no longer in the future. Not that he wouldn't be right.
According to the annual study on the school and professional options of eighth grade students, prepared by the Bucharest City Center for Educational Resources and Assistance (CMBRAE) in the 2023-2024 school year, 77% of Bucharest students choose their high school after consulting with the parents. Specifically, we are talking about 7,688 students, most of them from sector 6. While 3,606 students decided on their own which high school they will apply to, 3,498 consulted with friends before making this choice. As for teachers, principals or school counselors, they were hardly consulted at all. Just over 2% of children followed their recommendations.
School counselors, few and with many responsibilities
Robert Florea, the director of the Bucharest City Center for Educational Resources and Assistance (CMBRAE) explained to “Adevărul” that a school counselor could make some more than relevant recommendations, if he were consulted in this regard.
“The school counselor teacher has a number of duties and responsibilities. Among them, if we refer to the themes, we have self-knowledge, self-esteem, healthy lifestyle, career guidance, etc. The counselor also deals with children with CES, they must also act to prevent violence in schools. In addition, he still has class time. All this must be corroborated with the fact that there are very few school counselors in Romania”, he explained the situation.
At least until this year, says the director of CMBRAE, on average, the number of students assigned to a school counselor was over 1,300. Starting this year, an additional number of posts have been allocated at the national level.
“At the level of the Municipality of Bucharest, for example, the number of councilors was supplemented by 86 positions. Thus, through the reorganization, we reached an average of approximately 1,000 students to a single school counselor teacher. The problem is that if this counselor were to deal only with the school and professional orientation of the students, then his role would be much more visible, more important and more noticed. Or the counselor teacher does not only do that. He also has other duties”. Thuseit is normal not to be able to interact with all students, it is normal not to get to know each one individually, not to know their problems, school progress, etc.
The school counselor who recommends to students a certain high school, a certain profile, a certain direction in their future education is more than necessary. But although these people, as few as they are, exist, no one really asks for their help. Why? Another reason, in addition to the extremely small number of school counselors, has to do with certain particular situations.
“There are situations where parents know very well what exactly that child should do. There are situations in which the parents do not know and are not necessarily interested, and then the decision is made by the student according to variables related to his immediate environment: entourage, environment, friends, acquaintances, etc. There are other situations where dissonances occur, namely the child wants something, the parents want something else. And the consequences are seen later. It's what we call dropping out at the university level,” the director of the Educational Resources and Assistance Center also stated.
How to conduct student career testing
Why do we need school counselors? Because there are many parents who do not know or are not interested in encouraging their children to a higher education system such as high school. Because there are situations in which the students, even though they would like to, do not know which way to start and they do not have the support of the family. The school counselor would make the difference in these cases between an educationally lost child and a performing one.
“The counselor evaluates the students throughout the years, they know their evolution, they know exactly what would suit those children according to their knowledge, skills and preferences, explains Robert Florea. The monitoring of these children is done over the years, he added. “Students are counseled at group level, i.e. class level, or at individual level, with the consent of the parents. They are tested through a testing platform dedicated strictly to professional guidance. We have a contract with a provider of career testing packages and apply these methods at both middle and high school levels. The problem is that you cannot force anyone to undergo such testing, especially since it is done online, including from home. It is a link that the student can access and complete from anywhere. But it doesn't always do it”, said director Robert Florea, director of the Bucharest City Center for Educational Resources and Assistance. Therefore, for this career guidance process to really work, several actors must be involved: the family, children and teachers. Because spring is not made with just one flower.
According to the study carried out by the representatives of the institution, the students of the 8th grade chose their high school based on their personal skills, (46%) then on the criterion of “Proximity of the school to home” (33%) and then “Prestige of the school” (25 %). The situation is unchanged compared to last year. A school counselor has 800 students, in the 2023-2024 school year, even after the distribution of the 1,200 positions, according to the data of the Ministry of Education. More than half of the new positions were filled by teachers with grades between 5 and 6.99, according to edupedu.ro.
