Counselling
The JESS Counselling Team seeks to understand student mental health needs and offer short-term therapeutic support and throughcare to enhance personal growth and resilience.
We offer a confidential service to meet the needs of JESS students using developmentally appropriate methods. Support can be responsive or preventative and includes individual sessions, group work, parent information and teacher support.
There are three counsellors within the Primary Schools and a further two counsellors at Secondary. Each counsellor has knowledge of psychological development in childhood, mental health presentations and experience of different therapeutic frameworks (such as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Play Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy etc.).
Although methods used may differ, depending on age and presentation, each of the counsellors incorporate the foundations of therapy and embed these into our JESS Counselling Model.
The JESS five c's counselling model
The JESS Counselling approach enables students to explore their feelings, thoughts and actions whilst feeling safe and emotionally contained.
| CURIOSITY | We listen without judgment, use Socratics to explore and reflection to check understanding, drawing a shared meaning of the experience. |
| COURAGE | We hold difficult conversations and work through painful emotions to support self-reflection and awareness, the key to personal growth. |
| COMPASSION | We encourage the student to feel, provide validation and offer empathic connection. This supports the recognition of difficulties and ignites the seeds of motivation for change. |
| COMMITMENT | We develop a shared understanding of the experience, encourage acceptance and work through barriers to change. Often a strengths-based or solution focused approach is helpful to move through goals. |
| COLLABORATION | We work with the student, their family, key members of the school team and external agencies to advocate, scaffold and support. External involvement is based on need and whether the student consents to share their experience beyond the counselling space. |
For further details on the service and the importance of confidentiality within the counselling relationship, please refer to the Counselling Policy:
Always guided by our values
