Article
Guidance and Counselling Needs of Secondary School Students: A Descriptive Study
The study aimed at identifying guidance and counselling needs of secondary school students. The population for the study consisted of 42,000 students studying in secondary schools across west Tripura. The sample consisted of 100 students. A structured quantitative inventory for assessing guidance and counselling needs of students was developed. The tool consisted of five domains of needs, i.e. educational, vocational, personal, social and health-related. The data thus collected were analyzed through descriptive statistics, percentage, mean, standard deviation, cross tabulation and bar graph. Findings of the study revealed that 47% of students had moderate level of guidance and counseling needs, 32% had high level of needs and 21% had low level of needs. Thus 79% of sample under study required guidance and counseling of moderate to high level. Findings also indicated that the highest level of needs were for educational guidance, followed by vocational guidance, personal counseling, social counseling and health-related guidance. The findings of the study further revealed that girls had higher mean score for overall needs as compared to boys. However, the difference was very small and indicated that both boys and girls required guidance and counseling of systematic nature. The study concluded that secondary schools required an integrated, preventive and developmental guidance program with the help of a trained counselor. Implications of the study for school administrators, counselor, teacher and educational planner were also discussed. Suggestions were also made for strengthening the counseling program at secondary stage of education.
Result
Result refers to the results or outcomes of a study. In this study the findings from the data of 100 students have been presented. The findings showed that 47% of students required guidance and counseling of moderate level whereas 32% required guidance and counseling of high level and only 21% required of low level. Hence 79% of the students required guidance and counseling of moderate to high level. The highest domain mean was found for educational guidance (M = 3.91) followed by vocational guidance (M = 3.74), personal counseling (M = 3.58), social counseling (M = 3.36) and health related guidance (M = 3.21). The girls required guidance and counseling of higher level than boys as their mean score (71.20) was higher than that of boys (68.40). However, the difference was very small. The findings of the study indicated that the students required regular, ongoing, systematic, school based, and inclusive guidance and counseling services as most of the student’s required guidance and counseling. Only visible problems of students were not required to be solved through guidance and counseling.