Counselling Cannot Cure Systemic Harm

 

Everywhere you turn, schools are calling for more counsellors. And while support staff are absolutely essential, we need to ask: Support for what? What are we actually responding to?

Because if we’re being honest, we’re responding to a system that is the problem and adding professionals to try to undo the damage.

We are witnessing rising rates of anxiety, school refusal, depression, and behavioral distress. Children are communicating that something is wrong in countless ways, yet the dominant response is to highlight the growing mental health crisis without really asking why. Instead of addressing the root causes, we focus on treating symptoms. We refer them to counselling. We recommend assessments. We medicate. We manage the crisis rather than prevent it.

But the truth is this: the punitive approach embedded in our education system is damaging children’s mental health.

We punish children for being dysregulated in environments that are themselves dysregulating. We punish them for not complying with expectations that don’t fit their developmental needs. We focus on assimilation rather than accommodations. We isolate, suspend, restrain, and exclude children, not because they are dangerous, but because the system refuses to change. The system protects itself. But who is protecting the students?

When children are sent home, they don’t learn to behave better; they learn they don’t belong. These repeated exclusions fuel isolation, crush self-worth, and sever their connection to the school community. Many turn to distraction or escape. Some immerse themselves in video games. Others begin using substances to numb. Most concerning is when professionals suggest parents make home as unpleasant as possible, so the child will want to return to school and comply. This not only misses the point, but it also weaponises punishment and calls it inclusion. That is a profound misuse of power.

Our schools remain reactive, not proactive. We are building crisis response teams without ever asking why we are always in crisis.

This is not a call to end counselling. It is a call to use those services to support systemic change, not student compliance. We need mental health professionals who are empowered to question harmful systems, not just help children cope with them.

We cannot keep demanding that children adapt to environments that ignore their needs. Classrooms should be spaces of safety and belonging, not control and compliance. We need to redesign learning environments, rethink discipline, and root our systems in children’s rights.

We must stop acting surprised when children break down in systems that are breaking them.

The behaviour is not the problem. It is the signal.

And the signal is loud.

Until we shift our focus from fixing children to fixing the environments that fail them, no amount of counselling will be enough.

Let’s start where the real problem lies.