GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING (HMEF 5063)

DEVELOPMENT OF SCHOOL COUNSELLING SERVICE IN MALAYSIA & SCHOOL COUNSELLING EFFECTIVENESS IN MALAYSIA

By: Name: Zulheery Bin Ismail Matric No: CGS00766606

Lecturer: Dr. CECILIA CHAI MING SHING

OPEN UNIVERSITY OF MALAYSIA

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TABLE OF CONTENT

Chapter

Page Number

Question 1: Development of School Counselling Service in Malaysia 1. Introduction 2. History of School Counselling Development 3. Conclusion 3 4 8

Question 2: School Counselling Effectiveness in Malaysia 1. Introduction 2. Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Personal Issues 2.1 Features and Causes of Personal Issues 2.2 Challenges in Counselling Process 2.3 Interview Result with a School Counsellor 2.4 Increasing Counselling Effectiveness 3. Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Educational Issues 11 12 13 10 11

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14 15 15 16 18 18 20 23

3.1 Features and Causes of Educational Issues 3.2 Challenges and Approaches in Counselling Process 4. Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Vocational Issues 4.1 Features and Causes of Vocational Issues 4.2 Challenges and Approaches in Counselling Process
5. Conclusion

References

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Question 1

Development of School Counselling Service in Malaysia

1. Introduction Malaysia is a multiracial country with almost 30 million of current population. As the process of modernisation takes place, new social challenges emerge that would put the people into situations never encountered in previous era. This is caused by technologies, particularly communications ones such as internet, mobile phones and computers. Yet, since no current technologies could yet replace the old-fashioned direct communication, many messages were misunderstood and unfortunately could be conveyed to a large group of people in a short time. Thus, it would lead to the social challenges mentioned just now that would lead to certain problems such as personal issues. For example, texts and images posted in the popular social networking network such as Facebook can be exploited by irresponsible individuals by converting them into degrading notions or obscene photos, which can severely harm the youths self -esteem. Children and youth nowadays are vulnerable to these problems. And the role of school counselling service, which is available for these people, is required more than ever. In this article, we shall observe the initiation of the school counselling service throughout the humble years before independence in 1957 and the surge of the development in consecutive phases until the modern times. We shall observe the role of the government through Ministry of Education in boosting the process through various suggestions and circulars. More importantly, we also shall observe the role of school counselling service itself, which seems to mature as the time progress with these circulars that widen its scopes and functions.

These statements show that the school counselling is indeed becoming more relevant to the students in Malaysia. Still, this might be true for the current school counselling development. What about those times in the 60s until 70s when the nation was still new and developing? What were the factors that drive the progress of the school counselling service? It is hoped that this first part of the assignment would deliver some answers.

2. History of School Counselling Development The emergence of school counselling in form of guidance services in Malaysia was evidenced in 1939, when the British in Malaya published a booklet titled Panduan Kerjaya di Tanah Melayu bagi Ibu Bapa, Guru-guru dan Murid-murid. This initiation was later supported in 1955, when the government of Federation of Malaya published the Annual Report of Education. In the report, the government stated the recommendation of guidance teacher to be appointed in each school in Malaya. It demonstrated the governments recognition for guidance services which could be implemented to assist the school students evaluating their future career in the newly born nation. It was in 1963 when the government through the Ministry of Education (MOE) realized the importance of school guidance. MOE established Guidance & Counselling (G&C) Section within the Educational Planning & Research Division of the ministry. This statement is supported with a circular being issued in 1964, stating explicitly the importance of school guidance and recommendation for a definite course of action. This leaves a significant impact to the development of school counselling service in Malaysia. As a result, the ministry commenced training workshops and short courses to the teachers regarding vocational guidance. Also, in 1968, MOE issued a circular to direct all states education department to appoint guidance teachers in schools throughout the states. To survey the school guidance services, an officer from MOE was appointed specifically for this task. We

can observe that the government took concrete actions rather than suggestion which was made earlier in 1955. Nevertheless, within ten years, it is reported that the training had gone awry due to lack of sufficient fund (Ng and Ching, 2010). For example, the short courses were discontinued in 1973 due to UNICEF funding cut (Glamcevski, 2008). However, it did not possess as a hindrance to the overall progress of school counselling in the country. This can be observed in 1975, when a new circular was issued to regulate the counselling services in state level. Also, in 1976, a counsellor training program was introduced as a part of Master of Education postgraduate degree in Universiti Malaya (UM). It heralded the beginning of counselling services which was also being taught in the tertiary education institute other than workshops in the MOE. So far we observed the role of school counselling services mainly catered vocational guidance. The scope was brought to attention in 1979 when MOE issued a report titled Report of the Cabinet Committee on the Study of the Implementation of the National Education Policy. The ministry recommended that school counselling services should go beyond career or vocational guidance and provide a broad range of mental health service to the schools (Othman and Awang, 1993). This could leave a significant impact as the school counselling service is perceived having a potential role to help in building the inner characters of the students, particularly positive psychological characters, rather than catering the need to find suitable future jobs. This impact is observed in 1980. MOE announced the need for G&C teachers as important agents to control the drug abuse problem which began to infest among the youth in the country (Ng and Ching, 2010). The role of school counselling teachers are acknowledged when a group of college and school counsellors founded Malaysia Counselling Association in the same year. MOE required secondary schools to reorganize their priorities of activities

particularly regarding the controlling of drug problems in respective secondary education institutes. This problem would concern the country since Malaysia was located in the vicinity of the Golden Triangle in Indochina, which was one of the main drug manufacture and distribution hotspots in the world. The evidence of the level of concern can be assumed in the same year, when G&C Section came under the jurisdiction of School Division of MOE, instead of Educational Planning & Research Division. This organisational shifting of the G&C section was made in order to achieve good quality of school counselling, by placing the G&C Section under an organisation which directly managed the schools in the country. By 1981, a special officer was assigned to the G&C Section to specifically organise the preventive drug abuse counselling and educational programs. Also, this transfer of jurisdiction led to increase of training in school counselling services. This can be seen through universities and teacher training institutes, which began to offer G&C courses. First example was the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), which offered 1-year diploma of counselling program through its Department of Psychology started in 1980. This was regarded as the best counselling course during that time (Scorzelli, 1987). Second example was in 1981, when Universiti Pertanian Malaysia (UPM) offered bachelors degree of Educational Guidance and Counselling. Third example was in 1982, when Specialized Teacher Training Institute offered 1-year certificate counselling program. The existence of these institutes proved beneficial to the counselling teachers. For example, in 1982, Teacher Education Division of MOE commenced G&C courses for inservice counselling teachers. The counselling teachers then would have the opportunity to obtain Specialist Training Certificate after completing 8-week in-service training requirement. Upon the completion, they could continue their counselling study in the higher education institute like the diploma in UKM, degree in UPM or even postgraduate degree in

UM. The result had been encouraging. For example, in 1985, 888 teachers classified as counsellors were produced. 17 or 2% of them had masters degrees in counselling. Nevertheless, counselling teachers were still having dual role of teaching and counselling, a trend which continued until 1996. Until that year, other than trainings and counselling educations, some initiations and suggestions were made to increase the professionalism of school counselling. For example, in 1982, G&C Section of MOE implemented three mandatory requirements concerning teaching-counselling hours and duties. First, the counsellors-teachers taught only for 12 periods per week to give more time for counselling duties even it was still regarded as secondary compared to teaching. Second, all secondary schools had at least one guidance teacher or teacher-counsellors. And third, the numbers of teacher-counsellors are allocated according to school size. Glamcevski (2008), who interviewed Louise in 2004, concurred that these mandatory rules left the Malaysian schools a significant impact that would be felt in the 1990s. Finally, in 1984, MOE issued a circular that suggested all primary and secondary schools to appoint G&C teachers instead of merely secondary ones. In 1993, MOE published a guidebook titled Guide towards the Implementation of Guidance and Counseling Services in Secondary Schools (Panduan Perlaksanaan Perkhidmatan dan Kaunseling di Sekolah-Sekolah Menengah). The publishing of the guidebook showed the formalization of school counselling services, but the effect would be superficial as the overall structure of school counselling was still intact, such as the teachers were still required to teach and it was limited to secondary schools. It was in 1996 that the structure of school counselling in Malaysia was substantially altered and its quality uprated. MOE issued a circular requesting both primary and secondary schools principles to appoint full-time counsellors. Also, the circular stated to achieve the ratio of one counsellor to every 500 students. In 1997, another circular was issued declaring

that school counsellors must prepare record books in order to increase professionalism. These two years were indeed gave a boost to school counselling professions, as government declared Mental Health Policy in the same year of 1997. In 1998, Malaysian Board of Counsellors issued Act of 1998, mentioning that counselling practitioners must have accredited certificate which was proven by Board of Counsellors. Again this would boost the school counselling professionalism as it was acknowledged by an authoritative body of the profession. By 2000, all schools had at least one full-time counsellor, or properly addressed as guidance and counselling officer (Ng and Ching, 2010). In 2003, MOE started counselling courses for teachers attending post-bachelor degree teaching courses or Kursus Perguruan Lepasan Ijazah (KPLI) in teaching colleges. The teachers were required to complete 14-week counselling courses which were designed for counselling in primary schools.

2. Conclusion Malaysia is similar to United States, which the counselling services began in the schools. Also, according to Suradi and Rafidah (2005), the development of counselling services in Malaysia is closely related to the history of guidance and counselling in the schools. Hence, it is imperative to analyse the development according to periodical phases. We observed the development of school counselling service in Malaysia which was commencing in three phases. The onset of the first phase was in 1963, when the government, particularly the MOE realized the importance of school counselling in building the mind of the youth from school level which was concurrent with the building of the newly independent nation. The task of school counsellors was mainly to cater the vocational guidance to these youths. However, the progress was not without challenges due to the lack of local expertise in counselling, formal counselling courses and financial resources.

Yet these would not impede the progress of the second phase, which was initiated in 1980. We observed the rise of formal counselling courses being offered in many local tertiary education institutes. As a result, more school counsellors are produced and the acknowledgement of the profession was seen in the establishment of Malaysia Counselling Association. The threat of drug abuse also boosted the need for more effective school counselling service. The best point was the more holistic counselling approach than merely lending vocational guidance in the first phase. However, the dualistic nature of counsellors who also had teaching job seemed to impede the profession to attain full professionalism. The third and recent phase can be concluded in 1996, which genuine professionalism of the school counselling profession was attained by two aspects. First, it was the attaining the full-time job which the school counsellors or G&C officers, could allocate more time for counselling endeavours. Second, it was having full-time school counsellors in both primary and secondary schools. By having counselling exposure since the formative years in primary schools, it is expected for the school counsellors to have a crucial task of embedding positive mind and attitude. Currently, the development is a continuation of the third phase, which emphasizes professionalism of the task and its holistic approach. Based on the interview conducted with a counsellor in a secondary school in Batu Caves, Selangor, the author concludes that the profession is required more than ever in the history of school development in the country. Nevertheless, the question remains regarding the effectiveness of the counselling process being conducted by present counsellors. To what extent is the school counselling effective in helping students to cope with various issues? This would be discussed in the next question.

Question 2

School Counselling Effectiveness in Malaysia

1. Introduction Counselling service is quite new in Malaysia (Zakaria & Asyraf, 2011). This can be stated especially for the school counselling service. It is supported with the recent introduction of full-time school counsellor in 1996. This statement can be paradoxical since school counselling had been prevalent in Malaysia since the early years of independence back in the 1960s. This, we can deduct that school counselling in this country progressed rather slow yet gradually improved over time. The modern times possess a challenge to people especially the ones living in the city. According to Johari Talib (2009), 55% of the population of Malaysia live in the urban vicinity. The high living cost could lead to problematic families with problematic children, which they possess personal, educational, or vocational challenges, which are as complex as adults. Also, the schools are crammed with 35-50 students per class, exposing them to problems due to lack of attention by teachers. Due to this fact, the need for school counselling is more pressing than ever. This would lead to more effective counselling training courses that would produce highly effective school counsellors. According to Ng and Ching (2010), this could be materialized by: a) competition, due to the substantial number of new counsellors graduating from local and overseas institutions. b) market demand due to the pressing challenges of the modern world. c) clarification and tightening of licensure requirements (Masters-level holders are licensable compared to their bachelors-level colleagues).

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d) demand for increased professionalism, which due to increase in number of practitioners with Masters and doctoral level holders. e) influence from the internalization movement of the counselling profession, as the profession could be regarded not just a regular job, but an agent of the development of human psyche, which the clinical discoveries could be shared and discussed with counsellors all over the world. Hence, the career of school counselling in Malaysia provides a promising profession nowadays and the coming future. The questions remain, to what extent is the effectiveness of the current school counselling service in the country coping with students problems regarding their personal, educational and vocational issues? Are the counsellors are capable enough in addressing the mentioned issues? What are the other factors involved that would contribute to the current level of counselling effectiveness? And finally, what would be the suitable steps need to be taken in order to increase the level of effectiveness?

2. Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Personal Issues 2.1 Features and Causes of Students Personal Issues According to Mills (2000), personal issues are those that individuals deal with themselves and within a small range of their peers and relationships. Examples are parent divorces, significant loss experiences such as parent death, identity and role confusion, interpersonal relationship problems, gangsterism and sexual problems such as incest, homosexualism, premarital sexual activity and teen pregnancy. Some issues are novel coincident with the current Internet Age, such as internet addiction and virtual social relationship problems. The causes are due to their cognitive and emotive personal perceptions, which are largely influenced by the environment of their upbringing. In this case, social influence and dictation they received from their social upbringing proved to be significantly critical. Parents, peer

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pressure, and local communities are the potential factors since they are part of the individuals social circle. This personal issues suffered by the students can be explained through Erik Eriksons Theory of Psychosocial Development. It elaborates the virtues developed by individuals through social interactions they conducted throughout their lives. Five of the virtues, which are hope, will, purpose, competence and fidelity are exclusively outlined for children and adolescents. The success or failure of the achievement of the virtues could be explained, thus providing theoretical background for the counsellors to design suitable help systems and manage the problems that originated from the failures.

2.2 Challenges of Counselling Process in Coping Personal Issues However, counselling approach to coping personal could be a challenge to the school counsellors. According to the school counsellor who the author interviewed, personal issues prove to be the biggest challenge compared to educational and vocational ones. First, not many personal issues are reported and brought to the school counse llors attention. It is due to the nature of the issues being highly intimate and personal. Thus, the effect could only be seen through the projection of the students negative feelings via unfavourable behaviours and poor academic achievement. Second, even the personal problems were being managed, the students were largely being uncooperative and merely divulged the causes which were made up or superficial. This could be due to inferiority complex developed by the students which according to Erik Eriksons theory, the individuals feel themselves unworthy of attention, thus reluctant to seek help. As a result, even with the counsellors help, the effect would be not profound. Finally, some of the personal problems were outside the capability of the counsellor. According to Johari Talib (2009), counsellors could handle Category 1 problems, mainly catering the in-school issues such as laziness, and low motivation. The

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same could not be said to the Category 2 problems, which are more serious, out-school issues such as physical and sexual molestation, incest, juvenile criminal offences and child prostitution. There are four reasons that lead to the incapability of the school counsellors to handle the Category 2 problems, which are counsellors low efficacy, bureau cracy hindrance, school and communitys attitudes towards counselling services and the effectiveness of counselling courses attended.

2.3 Interview Result with a School Counsellor School counsellors low efficacy is due to their young age thus lack of experience, and low educational level which most of them do not have masters degree and above (Zakaria and Asyraf, 2011). To give the example, most of the four reasons stated above can be observed on a school counsellor being interviewed in a secondary school in Batu Caves, which happened to be the authors alma mater. She herself was young and recently graduated from a local university with a bachelors degree on counselling less than five years ago. When asked about her predecessor, she said that her predecessors left the school to pursue higher education or private counselling practice. She also professed that the teachers in the school were sometimes being jealous because she doesnt have teaching jobs. In other words, she holds a position which she could be close to the students without having to teach in the class. Besides, she has to do mostly administrative jobs rather than clinical one which is more related to counselling task. This would cause her to spend less time on the counselling endeavour, and thus having less experience. Ultimately this would lead to, according to Zuria (2005), a cyclic pattern of ineffective counsellors. This pattern revolves around the counsellors were given irrelevant job specs, which leads to poor performance, which leads to low expectation by the school administrators, which in return give another irrelevant job specs. She also shared with the author an account regarding one of her predecessor which

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happened to be a male counsellor. He was discharged because he sexually harassed a female student who had a personal issue of being socially isolated by her peers due to her crime for being pretty. This shows that supervision of counsellors is i mperative to prevent unethical counselling conduct, especially involving counsellors and students of different gender. She, being a Malay lady, sometimes faces few problems dealing with Malay female students, especially when her counselling process is overlapping with the Islamic guidance exerted by the ustazah or female religious teachers. She also faces a few problems in dealing with male or non-Malay students, due to gender and cultural-linguistic problems. Finally, she said that most of the serious cases would be handled by authoritative government bodies such as police and welfare department, rendering the counsellors with minimal intervention.

2.4 Increasing Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Personal Issues In order to increase the effectiveness among the school counsellors in coping the students personal issues, few steps need to be taken. First, the counselling profession need to be recognized as one of the crucial pillars for the school development. This can be realized by the image of the counselling profession as the agent of change regarding the students character-building experience in the schools. The administrators and teachers should see the school counsellors tasks which are as important as teaching not just in deve loping the character and the future of the students, but also the future of the nation. To achieve this, second step need to be considered. The school counsellors are supposed to have at least Masters-level education complete with licence acquired from the Malaysian Board of Counsellors. Each school in the country is required to have at least one counsellor with this qualification. This counsellor can provide guidance, training, and supervise new ones with bachelors-level degree. This approach would be similar to the newly graduated medical doctors who are supervised by the medical specialists. Ultimately,

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this would exhibit professionalism in counselling profession, lending credibility and reliability to its services. Also, the counselling process should involve all factions of society, particularly teachers, parents and communities. Teachers and parents might prove a challenge since they would claim that they are closer to the students. Yet, they should realize that the school counsellors are professionals who deal with the human psyche complete with years of training and experience. The role of the society is to aid in the counselling process by having confidence with the counsellors and providing valuable information about the troubled students. The society needs to pay heed to the counsellors advice. This can be regarding parenting skills for parents and supporting the students in the class for teachers. It is known that the communities, particularly the Malays are suspicious about anything with Western origin (Sumari and Fauziah, 2008). The counsellors could explain that counselling process is universal and most of the theories and techniques in counselling are congruent with the Islamic values, particularly about muhasabah or self-evaluation, which is about exploring ones own psyche or beliefs that caused the negative behaviour to materialize in the first place.

3. Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Educational Issues 3.1 Features and Causes of Educational Issues Educational issues involve the school and learning-specific challenges such as study motivation, inability to cope with studies, inability to read and write satisfactorily, selection of courses, time management, adapting to school social environment, and language difficulties. The cause could be personal issues that we discussed before, and socio-economic issues such as peer pressure and family conditions. Among the challenges, according to the school counsellor the author interviewed, study motivation proved to be main issue

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concerning the majority of the students in their education endeavour. The statement could be a matter of concern to the school since study motivation would influence the students overall academic achievement. Academic achievement is closely related to learning styles and motivation (Vijaya and Zanaton, 2012). Learning styles are individuals preferences to mode of information presentation or study approaches. Motivation is the psychological drive to commit to certain behaviour, in this case, the drive to study. Learning styles and motivation should be congruent to the students. For example in learning style, it is a common statement that students prefer learning environment that could stimulate all their senses (visual, aural, kinaesthetic). So, the teachers should present the information with colourful images complete with audio sample and genuine materials for the student to see and touch. For motivation, theory of Expectancy-Value could be applied. Expectancy is the students belief in achieving success and Value is the importance of that success to the students. Thus, the teachers should present the information in a convenient way that it causes the students to believe they could excel and increase the learning experiences value by positive reinforcement.

3.2 Challenges and Approaches of Counselling Process in Coping Educational Issues An obvious challenge would arise for the counselling process involving this issue is it the job for the teachers or counsellors? This is due to task for increasing the effectiveness of learning styles and motivation mentioned above which is preferably conducted by teachers than counsellors. Also, the teachers are close to the students in their respective class and who are given responsibilities t o supervise the students academic progression throughout the year. Thus, the real challenge is to delineate the task of counsellors and teachers regarding this issue. A solution can be outlined, for example the teachers scope of helping these

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students could be class-based and group-based. The counsellors scope could be schoolbased, personal-based and occasionally play an important part for the group-based counselling. Thus, the teachers initially manage the students educational problems, acting as the class counsellors. The group counselling can be conducted in a special class for those having difficulties in reading, writing or language. The counsellors could intervene to support the students emotionally. Also, the counsellors could teach them specific techniques. First example is the goal-setting technique, which is highly useful to give the students the sense of purpose in their study endeavour outlined by their teachers. Second, the counsellors could teach them essential study skills such as note-taking and time management skill. The techniques and skills should be on par with their thinking process. This is crucial to develop self-efficacy, which is a favourable belief system they develop regarding their own control over their study endeavour. The students would be referred to the counsellors personally if the students were realized to have more profound problems such as personal issues which the students are required special attention. Conclusively, we could observe that teachers and counsellors share the responsibility in assisting the students coping with their educational issues. Thus, the effectiveness of the counselling intervention could be fully achieved only with full cooperation of the class teachers. For the school-based counselling programme, the counsellors could hold a motivational seminar for the whole students who are sitting for the significant examinations such as UPSR, PMR and SPM. The school counsellors that the author interviewed expressed disapproval regarding the previous and current motivational seminars. This is because most seminars are conducted by outside speakers who frequently exploited the negative emotions by showing the videos of an adult lifestyle due to failure to achieve good grades in school, baby being born to arouse the feeling of remorse, and war-torn countries. Thus, the motivation should include more inspirational materials to induce positive emotions, such as

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the success story of the school alumni, which is more viable to increase the s tudents motivation, particularly intrinsic motivation. Also, a programme such as award-giving ceremony could be held, which is already popular in schools in Malaysia. The counsellors could arrange special awards, such as the most hardworking or the mos t grade improvement regardless their final result. These awards are meant to recognize the students effort rather than the usual awards that focus on final grade. The time in the school could be exploited by the counsellors organizing special days. We already observed the schools holding Speak English Day, Science Day and other academic-based days. The key is the students full participation. This could be attained by stating the value of the day, which is part of Expectancy-Value Theory discussed just now. With this students participation, a positive peer pressure could be generated which the students are inclined to join and contribute the day since all his/her friends are doing the same. Also, positive reinforcement should be given in form of praises, written recognitions and prizes for students who contribute significantly to the mentioned day. The reinforcement should be made visible to all students. Hence, the positive learning environment could be created and maintained, thus, increasing the students overall study motivation. As a result, counselling effectiveness on the school-level could be positively achieved.

4. Counselling Effectiveness in Coping Vocational Issues 4.1 Features and Causes of Vocational Issues Vocational issues involve the students making the right career choice and having the right attitude to prepare for the working world. It is a challenge required to be managed properly by the students in shaping their career development. As Saviks (2003) summed the term career development:

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as one that fosters vocational development and work adjustment of individuals at each life stage by engaging them in life planning aimed at psychological integration of individuals abilities, interest and goals with the work roles structured by the community and occupations organized by companies. The term life stage can be defined the phases of the students life which the career preference is shaped. Hence, it begins during the primary until the tertiary education level. The career of choice should be congruent to the students abilities, which are the students academic or non-academic strengths, interest, which is the students emotive predilection and goals, which are the set of plans that provide the students a sense of purpose. However, the features would be made ineffective if the career of choice is not available in the job market. Recently, Malaysia is plagued with the issue of university graduates having difficulties in searching for job after finishing their study. How is that so? According to CIA World Factbook (2013), Malaysias unemployment rate for 2012 estimate was remarkably low with merely 3% or ranked 176th position among the 201 countries in the world. To be specific, the unemployment rate for youth (15-24 years old) was 11% or ranked 99 among 130 countries. Adults in some developed countries are left more jobless than those in Malaysia, such as Japan and Austria with both unemployment rate of 4.4%, Germany (6.5%), United Kingdom (7.8%), United States (8.2%) and France (9.8%). Coupled with the throng of immigrants coming to our country, some with illegal means, shows that the prospect of getting jobs is relatively positive. Yet, Malaysian university graduates are said to be choosy with their career choice. In spite of their youth and inexperience, they prefer highly professional jobs and demand high starting salary, which most of the companies reserve to the senior and experienced workers. If the companies hire the freshly graduated students, it was only a selected few who excelled outstandingly or graduated from overseas institutes. As a result, the available jobs are eventually filled by the

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immigrants. Ultimately, the students are forced to turn to the jobs not corresponding to their preference or throw themselves to the mercy of the government. The cause could be found in the students formative years during their primary and secondary schools. For example, the parents and the teachers focus too much on their children and students getting good grades without providing them a sense of direction for the future. This would lead the students making poor career choice due to lack of knowledge and guidance. Next, the non-academic skills such as communication skills are largely ignored, which could be a highly advantageous to the career development when the students become proficient with them. Also, the cause is found in the nature of the career itself. For example, the rapid and continuous changes of career landscape contribute to the poor career choice due to the modern technologies, which in turn create much new type of careers. Hence, it is a challenge to evaluate the suitable careers not just according to the students abilities, preference, and goals, but to the changing time.

4.2 Challenges and Approaches of Counselling Process in Coping Vocational Issues Vocational issues are the central focus of the school counsellors. In fact, the school counselling was first established in order to help the students discover the careers they wish to pursue and outline the necessary paths to achieve the goals regarding the chosen careers. Recently, the counsellors approach is more student -based, which they focus on students initiative to explore and determine their own preference and career paths (Phillips & Sharifah, 2007). In short, the role of counsellors nowadays is more into supportive and consultative rather than directive, which was synonym with the counsellors of the early years in the history of counselling. However, tackling the vocational issues comes with its own set of challenges. For example, career counsellors in technical and vocational schools assume that the students have

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already chosen their career (Rosenbaum & Pearson, 2003). This is because the students attend the school which they are taught certain technical skills that can be explicitly utilized in their future world of works. The counsellors should realize that the skills ought to be correspondent to the students interest as well. Furthermore, the skills obtained might be applied diversely into plethora of profession types. Hence, the counsellors should guide the students into these professions and discover the specific one that would be compatible to the students preference. Another challenge is the students in Malaysia are generally having no sense of direction even 11 years of compulsory education (Glamcevski, 2008). According to Glamcevski as well, this is due to the school counsellors who lack of adequate assessment to evaluate the students abilities, discover their interest, and determine their goals. The cause can be traced from the statement of Malaysian schools which mostly have inexperienced school counsellors, as discussed in the previous personal issues section. The students have a potential set of abilities and interest. Yet, without purpose and career opportunity, their potential would be rendered ineffectual. That is why experienced school counsellors are highly favoured in order to design counselling programmes to bring the best of the students experience of finding their suitable future careers. Finally, the challenge might come from the parents. Students might already recognize their career abilities, interest, goals and available career opportunities. Yet, the features above would be rendered ineffectual as well if the students do not receive significant amount of support from their parents. In this case, the counsellors could outline the best alternatives for both parents and students to come into agreement regarding the career choice. Also, the counsellors could share to the parents that there are many respectable jobs, not just doctors, lawyers, engineers. Still, as mentioned before, the role of school counsellors should be strictly consultative and supportive, not directive.

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To conduct the vocational counselling process, some programmes could be suggested. For example, a Career Day could be held in schools. This is a popular approach in Malaysia. The key is to make the event as profound as possible to the students. The counsellors could organize talks that would share crucial scopes regarding the career of choice such as job requirements, market, prospect, lifestyle, income, and local/international opportunities. Also, the counsellors should organize a session for questionnaires or psychometric tests. This is to induce self-exploration and self-evaluation, where the students would critically analyse themselves and this could be an important first step in their career search endeavour. Fortunately, this is one of the routine programmes being conducted in schools throughout Malaysia. One important precaution is that the result obtained should be treated as useful guidance, not definitive result. For example, after the tests, the student finds that his or her personality is suited to work as a film director or actor/actress, but his/her interest reveals otherwise. Next, the counsellors could invite companies and universities in Malaysia to open their booths and share success stories regarding their workers or alumni. A career show could be organized by showing a simulation of a job being re-enacted in a fun, aspiring way. For example, graphic artist drawing a masterpiece, race drivers on racetrack, pilot skilfully operates an aircraft, doctors treating a critical patient, or teachers/counsellors inspiring a group of students. This approach is best conducted for the primary school students in order to raise their interest to certain jobs that caught their attention. Finally, a mock job interview could be held. The students verbal proficiency would be put to the test, shared and evaluated. The counsellors and students could discuss what techniques could be learnt in order to increase their communication skill. As a result, the students would gain new skills and confidence, a highly favourable combination to form the positive attitude in order to prepare themselves for the working world.

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The programmes outlined above could be conducted in combination for the Career Day, or held separately on their own accord. The key is the programmes should be conducted by experienced counsellors or inexperienced ones under supervision, and involve all factions of society such as parents, teachers and communities, which both details have been discussed in the personal issues section.

5. Conclusion According to Lapan et al. (2007), professional school counselling is crucial on maximizing the students success. In this article, it is the success of the students in managing their personal, educational, and vocational issues. This success is also credited to the counsellors who provide support and consultation. We already discussed the challenges faced by the counsellors and specific steps to deal with them. Remarkably, most of them are controllable and manageable. Thus, we can conclude that the effectiveness of the school counselling process is largely depended on the competence of the counsellors. We already discussed that according to Zakaria and Asyraf (2007), most school counsellors in Malaysia are lack of experience due to young age and minimum qualification (bachelors degree). I wish to reiterate the statement by the same evidence, which reasserted that counselling practitioner in educational setting were mainly women, young, and inexperienced. Also, most counsellors in Malaysia were not registered and did not have practicing certificate. They added that the counsellors operated mainly in schools and did not use proper theories, which unfortunately affect counselling as a whole. However, it is too early to conclude that the school counselling in Malaysia is largely ineffective. According to a study by Bakar, Mohamed and Zakaria (2011), school counsellors in Malaysia have moderately positive work value, which means the counsellors relatively esteemed their profession in a favourable perspective. Hence, the overall effectiveness of

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school counselling service in the country is potentially positive. It could be improved through the suggestions outlined by Ng & Ching (2010), which were: a) applying reliable assessments through systematic theoretical framework b) discovering more empirical findings through research c) discovering more actual clinical findings through direct practice. Coupled with the increasing the credibility of the counsellors through education (Masters-level and above), and the involvement by all factions of society through full cooperation, the credibility and reliability of the school counselling could be further improved. Ultimately, it is hoped that this will increase the effectiveness of this mostmisunderstood yet wonderful profession.

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