A Funny Mix

I attended a retreat for school counsellors organised by MOE yesterday. At the session I moved around with my colleague, the school counsellor from my school. So I went along and joined her ex classmates at a round table of young people perhaps all below 30. I felt rather out of place as they laughed and chatted catching up with each other. Suddenly one of them, a young woman likely to be in her mid 20s and who was seated across the table, looked at me and asked almost rudely, "Are you sure you want to sit with us?" I stared at her puzzled, wondering what she is driving at. "I mean we are very loud, you know" she continued. Seeing my speechless expression, one of her friends quipped, "only she is loud, we are not". Regaining my composure, I said "I am fine with it, maybe it will be more exciting sitting here".

I pondered why she made that remark. Did my facial expression betray any diapproving response whilst listening to their conversation? Did I look far too prim and proper for her liking? Did she find my presence suffocating or did I remind her of her mother hahaha? Phew! I was honestly a bit taken aback by such frankness. Then it dawned on me that she was probably taking care of me (counsellors are very caring you know). She probably felt I would enjoy myself more if I joined the elderly crowd. You have to know the dynamics in that ballroom of about 300 school counsellors to see where she was coming from. It was a funny mix. The crowd seemed to be equally divided into 2 groups at different ends of the age spectrum; a group of energetic young men and women and a group of patient and amiable looking elderly men and women nearing or post retirement. How does this age extremes come about? Some years ago after recognising the need to have counsellors in schools MOE embarked on 2 schemes. Firstly it opened an avenue for teachers to become counsellors after going through a crash counselling course. Another scheme incentivised retired teachers and principals to become part time school counsellors after receiving similar training. In recent years however, MOE revised their policy and differented school counsellors from school teachers ie. placed them on different schemes of employment. School counsellors came under the Allied Educators (AE)scheme which enjoyed less benefits than the EO or Education Officer scheme where teachers fall under. To help solve the problem of a shortage in teachers MOE now offered those teacher turned school counsellors an option to revert back to being a teacher. Those counsellors who chose to stay on will then be placed on the less beneficial AE scheme. Needless to say most young school counsellors chose to revert to being teachers. Those who opt to remain as counsellors tend to be the older ones. This explains the older group of school counsellors. What about the young crowd in the room then? Where are they from? Well, facing the shortage of school counsellors MOE subsequently recruited from outside any degree holders with or without counselling qualification, again providing training for thoses without. Amongst them are young social workers as well as young people from various disciplines searching for their ideal job fit.

However I do not belong to any of the groups mentioned above. I am more of a free lancer engaged by the school and not by MOE and added to the mean age of the crowd.

As the day progressed I felt rather bored sitting with that young crowd. They seemed really childish and their jest and jokes weren't funny to me at all. I was also stunned by the blunt remarks they threw at one another. I couldnt tell when they were fooling around and when they really meant what they said. Gosh this generation gap thingy is for real.

The youngsters dominated the dialogue session with the Dy Director of MOE, focusing on employment benefits, scope of work, etc. I recall only 2 remarks made by the older group at the dialogue session. One requested for the observation of a minute of silence for a colleague who had passed away recently, someone who had initiated and pushed for the school counsellors to be introduced in schools. Another remark was some kind of advice in response to comments made by a young counsellor about the unrealistic expectations of counsellors by some principals and school leaders.

At a break away session thereafter, we were told to work as a group to come up with 3words which we deemed best describe the role of a counsellor and to create a mission statement. 2 words were unanimously agreed upon by my group, namely "Care" and "Empower". There were differing views for the third word. I suggested "Empathise" whilst the same young lady across the table wanted the word "Change" and went rhetoric on why that word was so important. I could not be bothered to defend my suggestion. It was then put to a vote and "Empathise" won hands down. I felt a small victory! Who's really childish? Sigh...