What CBSE helpline getting queries on break-ups, memory loss, ill-treatment by parents reveals
In India, one student commits suicide every hour.
With CBSE Class 10 and Class 12 exams set to begin from March 5, the board helpline is predictably flooded with calls from students. However, the calls are not only about exam woes. According to reports, students have been calling up to discuss matters such as break-ups and ill-treatment by their parents.
Hindustan Times quoted a counsellor recounting a call he received by a student: “I had a break up recently and I don’t feel like studying at all. I can’t think about anything else but her.” Another counsellor received a call from a student “complaining about her father and how he mistreats her in front of everyone”.
Breakups and parent troubles are not unique to the months of February and March. Why, then, is help restricted to the time board exams are around the corner?
These reports once again highlight the urgent need for qualified counsellors for students. While not every school has the financial resources to hire counsellors, the CBSE can consider making the helpline a year-round service.
In India, one student commits suicide every hour. As recently as February 23, a 19-year-old student killed himself in Madhya Pradesh because he was stressed about the approaching board exams.
In the recent months, we have heard multiple cases of disturbing crimes being reported from schools – a student allegedly killing a junior, another threatening his teacher and her daughter with rape.
Such incidents and the calls to the helpline go on to show that children, specially teenagers, need help, and do not have avenues to turn to. While there is a helpline, 1098, for all children, a facility specifically for teenagers in school will help cater to a vulnerable group better.
Parents and teachers may not be enough
Multiple factors are responsible for this. Increasingly, students and their parents are living in what are almost different worlds. Guardians are simply not prepared for the influences that the internet and globalisation have brought into their children’s lives. There is a huge gap in what is “normal” for students and parents in terms of social conduct, gender interactions, and what they want from their lives.
Parents understandably feel it is their duty to steer their children towards making “safe choices” – staying away from drinks, alcohol, teen romances, taking up subjects that lead to “stable” careers – even at the cost of temporarily alienating the kids.
Also, parents come with their own set of human failings. While it would undeniably be ideal, one cannot expect parents alone to overcome their internalised insecurities and prejudices to give their teen children the guidance they need.
Then there are cases where parents are indeed the problem – not all children come from happy homes where adults are devoted to their well-being.
Teachers, in most schools, are too burdened with myriad responsibilities to be able to focus on every student individually, especially as lots of teenagers make active efforts to hide their problems.
Most importantly, parents and teachers have not been trained to handle mental health issues, and the importance of a professional cannot be overstated. Many a time, all a teenager needs is an understanding adult to talk to, but often she might need more help than that. Only a qualified professional can render this help.
Also, it is far easier to approach strangers and confide in them rather than turn to those who you have to face even after the urge to share has passed.
Not all schools can afford counsellors
At a time when government schools are struggling to hire the sufficient number of teachers, they cannot very well be expected to pay qualified counsellors. Also, in smaller communities, it is much easier to seek help over the phone than be seen walking up to a counsellor.
In such a scenario, the government should think of keeping the helpline service active even after the board exams are over, and expanding its scope.
For areas that do not have telephone connectivity, the government can organise counselling camps every few months.
The mental health of students is probably the most important aspect of growing up. It is high time counsellors are recognised as being as integral to the process of education as teachers.