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The Youth Development Programme was started in
1998, in response to a sharp increase in suicide
amongst teenagers. Family life was fractured,
there was a high rate of unemployment, HIV and
AIDS were wreaking havoc within the community,
and young people were suffering the fallout. Their
feelings of self worth were at a low ebb. Many
children had turned to drugs, the truancy rate
was high and pupils were dropping out of school.
Schools were experiencing problems with gangsterism
and bullying and many young people were becoming
victims. Of course, these and other issues are
still present in schools today, but at that time
there was not much in place to deal with these
problems, and schools turned to organisations
like LifeLine and Childline for assistance.
One thing that LifeLine and Childline had realised
through its work with adolescents was that often
children are more comfortable talking about their
problems with their peers. We started with this
idea and worked from there, to set up programmes
in as many schools as possible.
Each school has different needs and we try to
cater to these as much as possible. We offer two
programmes, each of which runs for four to six
weeks. Who Am I is adapted from LifeLine's Personal
Growth Course, and the Peer Counselling Skills
course has been developed to enable peer mediation
and counselling. Sometimes we amalgamate these
two programmes and run them as one course. Both
courses are very participative and experiential,
with no lectures, and lots of role-playing.
Once a school has approached us, we work out
exactly what they need. If a school asks us to
concentrate on a specific area of concern we highlight
this during the time that we have with the learners.
I then go in and deliver a short presentation
about the course, to give learners some idea of
what will be in store for them. In some schools,
children sign up for the course, in others, the
learners and school leaders identify whom they
want to take the course and then we work with
these learners. The learners who pass the course
are awarded certificates at a special assembly,
where they take a pledge in front of the whole
school. We explain to the school how the peer
counselling will work. A special room is allocated
to the peer counsellors and a duty roster is worked
out. Learners can go to their peers and talk to
them about their problems. If needs be, peer counsellors
then liaise with a teacher or school counsellor
and take the situation from there. As with all
work that we do, confidentiality is most important,
and it is only with the permission of the learner
that information is passed on. We return to the
schools where programmes have been set in place,
either to give the learners further training,
or to ensure that everything is running smoothly.
Initially, when LifeLine and Childline started
these programmes, I worked on Youth Development
part-time, in addition to my other duties. However,
the demand has been so great that I have since
been put in charge of Youth Development on a full-time
basis. As always, and I know that you'll hear
this from anyone involved in any aspect of LifeLine
and Childline work, manpower and finances are
a stumbling block. In order to sustain the programmes
we need to keep in touch with all the schools
running them. The ideal would be to have a dedicated
member of staff or a support officer in each school
whom the peer counsellors can approach when they
need help with problems that are too big for them
to deal with on their own. The guidance counsellors
do a wonderful job, but they already have a full
workload. Teachers are overloaded, and asking
them to take on a job like this as part of their
portfolio is difficult. Maintenance of the programmes
is often the most frustrating aspect of the work
I do, that and having to turn away schools that
need our services because we are already fully
booked. It's sad to see a system that works so
well, and which has achieved such positive results
being crippled by financial and manpower restraints.
A recent Education Department mandate has stipulated
that all schools must have a peer counselling
system in place by 2005. With this in mind, I
am hoping to work in partnership with a drama
group that goes into schools and gets the learners
involved in looking at social issues through drama.
Drama is an incredibly powerful tool, and one
that can unleash very powerful feelings in young
people. These feelings need to be explored, and
issues that surface in the drama workshops have
to be dealt with. I hope to be able to set up
Youth Development Programmes to follow on from
the workshops. This would complete the circle,
by providing an ongoing programme of support and
counselling. Through this, teachers, counsellors
and peer counsellors will be able to identify
more youth at risk, youth who need long-term therapy,
youth who need someone to intervene for them because
of their family situations.
So many of the issues we deal with stem not from
problems at school, but from problems within the
family. The more I read about this, the more research
I do, the more I realise that everything comes
back to the family, to a child's background. Sadly,
many parents do not seem capable of taking responsibility
for their children's well being. It's easier to
say yes than no, it's easier to accept what a
child says at face value instead of probing a
little deeper, to find out how they really are.
The child who says he's okay when asked, is often
not okay, but this isn't realised until it's too
late, when the problems become too big to be ignored.
In many instances, parents need to realise that
a child is only capable of dealing with a certain
amount of power and control. It's up to the parent
to establish boundaries, to know when to extend
those boundaries. Parents do need to be flexible,
they do need to be able to negotiate, and they
have to acknowledge their children as people with
needs and opinions. However, they also need to
stay in charge. Teachers cannot be expected to
fulfil the vital roles of parent and guardian.
They may be able to identify and help a certain
number of children, but they don't have the time
or the resources to help all children. It's up
to us as parents, if we don't want to see our
children falling through the cracks.
One of my dreams is to see internal intercom
phone systems set up inside the schools. In this
way, learners could phone a peer counsellor, if
they don't feel comfortable talking with them
face to face. For many young people this could
be the first step towards changing their lives.
I'd like to see this idea expanded yet further
as many young people feel that they are too old
to call Childline, too young to call LifeLine.
For the rest? I want to see the Youth Development
Programme going from strength to strength. I'd
love to train up a team of counsellors who could
spread the load and so spread the positive benefits
of these programmes in as many schools as possible.
In all schools...
If you would like to find
out more about the Youth Development Programme,
please phone Bernie at the Bishop Lavis Centre
: 021 934 4822
If you would like to make a
donation to LifeLine/Childline Western Cape's
Youth Development Programme, please click here.
Kelly, a Grade 10 pupil, has recently completed
the Who Am I and Peer Counselling Skills courses.
In August 2004 I put my name down for the Youth
Development course. I had already done a peer
counselling course when I was in junior school,
directed mainly at being a peer mediator when
fights broke out. There we learned about fight,
flight and flow, and the ways in which different
people react to conflict. The LifeLine/Childline
course was also aimed at this, but it placed great
focus on self-awareness and personal development.
We attended five sessions, each two hours long.
I have benefited greatly from doing this course.
I asked my mom and close friends if they had noticed
any changes in me, and they all commented on how
much calmer I am. I don't find things, like exams,
as stressful as they used to be. Doing the course
has helped me to realise that things are meant
to be, but I have control over how I would like
to see them develop in the best way for me. I'm
more relaxed, more willing to face things and
sort them out instead of walking away. This is
something we learned on the course. Walking away
from something doesn't necessarily solve any problems,
all it does is build up a store of negative resentment,
resentment that surfaces the next time you find
yourself in a conflict situation. Sure, you may
need time out, to assess a situation, to cool
down, but then it's a good idea to take positive
steps towards sorting it out.
The first part of the course concentrated on
personal growth, helping us to see that we need
to know more about ourselves before we can mediate
between other people or be available for them
to come to us with their problems. We then learned
how to cope with arguments and fights, and how
to make sure that our peers felt comfortable talking
to us. In the last session we role-played and
gave each other feedback on our abilities. We
rated each other on the skills we had learned
during the course, and how well we had used them
in the role play situation. We rated on
• how comfortable we made people feel;
• how well we reflected feelings;
• how well we reflected the problems in the given
situation; and
• how good our overall counselling skills were.
We marked our peers on a scale of 1 - 5, with
1 being the highest rating. My peers rated me
with three 1s and a 2.
During the course we were put into groups with
people we didn't know well at all. The people
in my group were not my friends, but by the time
the course ended, I had made a group of new, good
friends. Now we meet, chat and SMS each other
regularly! Each group had to make a mascot, and
we called ours Nanawacis, an acronym of the first
names of all the girls in the group (with a few
vowels added in!)
We haven't started to work as peer counsellors
yet. We'll take over from the counsellors who
leave at the end of this year. In the meantime
though, we've formed a Peer Counselling group
and had a cake sale. We'll use the proceeds for
Orientation Day, when the new Grade 8s arrive
at the school. We're going to buy prizes for a
games day, let them have some fun, and show them
that senior school isn't as scary as it seems.
Although I haven't counselled anyone yet, I have
experienced how effective the peer counselling
system is. When I was in Grade 8, I encouraged
a friend of mine to talk to one of the peer counsellors.
She was cutting herself, and I thought whoa, this
is too big for me to handle. She was battling
to settle in at school, and she had other problems
as well. Finally she spoke to a peer counsellor
and she was able to sort things out.
Something like that, having to counsel someone
who is cutting herself, is a big issue. It's important
to know the correct procedure.
• We have to create an atmosphere which is non-judgemental
so that the person who comes to see us feels free
to talk and express herself.
• We break the problem down into all the parts.
For example, the girl's parents may be in the
middle of a divorce, she may be battling with
schoolwork, she may feel she doesn't fit in.
• We create an atmosphere of friendship, one where
the person feels that we're there for her, to
see her through as she comes to terms with the
problems she's experiencing.
• We look at the various ways in which the problem
could be sorted out; we evaluate each of them
together and look at what the possible results
of any action might be.
• Then it's a case of choosing the option that
will work best. Here, it's up to the person who
has the problem to find the solution that will
work best for her. We can't tell her what to do.
It's quite scary, quite a responsibility, but
we have to trust the process and know that the
decision a person takes is the best one for them
according to their situation. The main idea behind
all of this is to provide people with someone
to whom they can talk. Someone whom they feel
will understand.
If we feel that a problem is too big for us to
deal with on our own, we can speak to the guidance
counsellor at any time. We do this without giving
the girl's name, and ask for advice on what to
say to her and what to suggest. In a situation
like this we can also encourage the girl to see
the counsellor, and often, after they have talked
things through with us, they are prepared to do
this.
The peer counselling system is one that works
really well. Many girls have problems and worries
that they feel are too small to bother the school
counsellor with. It's good for them to know that
there is someone to talk to. Many teenagers feel
that they aren't heard - by their parents, or
their teachers. Sometimes they feel they have
issues they can't discuss with their friends.
If they feel secure, and know they can talk to
a peer counsellor, this helps.
One thing that is vital in all peer counselling
sessions is that everything we are told remains
confidential. Tremendous trust is placed in us,
and we have to prove ourselves worthy of that
trust. During one of our training sessions, Bernie,
our facilitator, role-played a situation in which
she showed the result of a peer counsellor betraying
the trust put in her. The role-play was incredibly
effective and it put us in the shoes of someone
whose trust had been abused.
There's quite a lot of fighting in any school.
Some of the fights are really vicious, some of
them are arguments that started over something
small and have blown up out of all proportion.
When there is a fight, we speak to both of the
parties involved, at the same time. In this way
each person can hear everything being said, and
each can hear what the other person feels. If
we feel the need, if for example we are talking
to two very upset girls, we can call on another
peer counsellor to be there. We all work together,
to see the chain of events that led up to the
problem, to get people talking to each other,
not screaming.
Bullying is another issue at school, and it's
as prevalent in girls' schools as it is in boys'.
Once again, a peer counsellor would get both people
together, the person being bullied and the bully.
Often, the person who bullies is insecure and
feels the need to prove herself by being really
mean. There's a great deal of emphasis placed
on peer pressure in schools, but bullying is an
equally big problem.
Fighting is such a waste of time and energy,
this is something that was brought home to me
in a big way during the course. When I find myself
being drawn into an argument, or starting one
because I've had a bad day and I want to take
my frustrations out on someone else, I try to
practise some of the techniques we were given.
One of them is to go to my secret garden. We spent
a long time imagining this place during one of
the training sessions - where it is, what it looks
like. It's a place that belongs to us only. When
I visit my secret garden, I feel calm, more in
control, and things don't seem as bad. Another
really brilliant exercise we did was taking an
imaginary walk up an imaginary mountain. At the
top of the mountain, sitting next to a fire, we
found the Wise One. We talked to the Wise One
and before leaving, were given a special gift.
We had to imagine this gift. I know what mine
is. I'm not sure what it means yet, but one day,
something will happen, and I'll understand why
I was given it and how I should use it.
If you would like to
find out more about the Youth Development Programme,
please phone Bernie at the Bishop Lavis Centre
: 021 934 4822
If you would like to make a
donation to LifeLine/Childline Western Cape's
Youth Development Programme, please click here.
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