Abstract

The study  investigated emerging issues in counselling for sustainable human development among {his lyinest£ t© I :. ·5 Sf T th 5 students and teachers of public and private secondary schools in Abia State. ['wo researct questions and one hypothesis were raised for this study. Descriptive survey research design was used for this study. The instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire. The population of this study consists of 213 teachers and 1,784 students drawn from 18 public and private secondary schools in Abia State. A total sample of 180 respondents was sampled using stratified random sampling techniquedrawn from 18 secondary schools in four Local Government Areas of the Abia State. A 22 item questionnaire was designed using the likert scale model and validated by three experts, one in Psychology and Counselling, two in the Measurement and Evaluation, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike. The reliability of the instrument was determined using test re-test method and data obtained were analyzed using Pearson Product Moment Correlation and yielded a coefficient of 0.85. The data collected were analyzed using percentage and frequency to answered research . questions while hypothesis was tested using chi-square statistic at 0.05 level of significance The study found that emerging issues students sought for Guidance and Counselling were education, vocational and private while the teachers visit the counsellor on personal issues mostly (61%). The respondents (75%) stated that Guidance and Counselling programme is not carried out by schools adequately due to poor funding and negligence. Counselling services rendered in private schools were not significantly different from that of public schools. Therefore, the specialized skills of the school counsellors need to be tapped to prevent, and treat increasing psychosocial problems of the students and teachers to provide sustainable human development in secondary schools. Based on the findings, it was recommended that, aJI schools should provide basic resources for guidance and counselling; funding of the Guidance and Counselling programmes in schools should be increased and more school counsellors should be employed. Keywords: Emerging Issues, Counselling, Sustainable Human Development