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Speaker 1: Now a lot of discussion over the school counselors. A

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Speaker 1: lot of people are really fired up over this whole situation.

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Speaker 1: Joining me on the line right now is Sanderson Middle

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Speaker 1: School Council Chair Mark Ferguson.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, Mark, Good.

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Speaker 3: Morning Katie, and you listen. How are you? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: Not too bad, bit confused, bit frustrated. I think you'd

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Speaker 1: have to say, following on from the interview a little

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Speaker 1: earlier this morning with the Education Department, Mark, did you

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Speaker 1: hear that and what did you make of it?

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Speaker 3: I did hear that, and I don't think the Education

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Speaker 3: department knows what they're doing for a start, because we're

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Speaker 3: all confused as well. I can be price. Can I

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Speaker 3: just say that the CSC captain did an absolutely amazing job.

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Speaker 3: They spoke really well yesterday, and I must say give

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Speaker 3: them all the credit that they deserve.

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Speaker 1: I agree with you absolutely.

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Speaker 2: I agree with you. Do you know?

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Speaker 1: I always think to myself when people come into the

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Speaker 1: studio for an interview, it can be very nerve racking.

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Speaker 1: Are you're talking about two young women who did an

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Speaker 1: outstanding job at standing up for their school and for

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Speaker 1: the whole student community. And I think that it was

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Speaker 1: phenomenal that they were brave enough to come in here

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Speaker 1: and do that.

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Speaker 3: Oh, absolutely, Katie, and they need to be commended for it.

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Speaker 3: Well done form.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, I agree.

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Speaker 3: Let me start by saying that we do have a

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Speaker 3: school counselor. At the moment, we don't know whether she's

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Speaker 3: moving yet. This is why we're fighting. Unfortunately, she can't

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Speaker 3: tell us whether she is moving or not because it's

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Speaker 3: all confidential still. But our counselor at Santa Fa Middle School,

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Speaker 3: she actually services for other feeder schools. So not only

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Speaker 3: is she doing Santa for middle school, she's doing a

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Speaker 3: Norla Primary school, She's doing Willagi Primary School, She's doing

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Speaker 3: Welgerman Primary School, Malac Primary School. That's a huge effort

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Speaker 3: for her. She's been doing that for nearly I think

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Speaker 3: eighteen months now.

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Speaker 2: Wow.

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Speaker 3: She does have a six week waiting list as well

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Speaker 3: of students that she sees. But she's basically based at

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Speaker 3: Sanderson and she cannot move from Sanderson at the moment

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Speaker 3: because there's so many people wanting and students wanting her.

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Speaker 3: So one of the feeder schools I will I can't name,

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Speaker 3: So one of the feeder schools had a student they

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Speaker 3: wanted to commit to a sign. So what that school

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Speaker 3: had to do was filling a piece of paper, send

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Speaker 3: it to the Education department. They put it in a

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Speaker 3: data base, they put it on a tree arche, and

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Speaker 3: the very next day they actually sent a counselor out.

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Speaker 3: After everyone's stomping and all that, my child who goes

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Speaker 3: for that school, I had their teachers in tears coming

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Speaker 3: to me going, what do we do? What you know?

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Speaker 3: Is there a counselor somewhere? Can we do this? Can

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Speaker 3: we do that? And unfortunately it took twenty four hours,

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Speaker 3: so overnight that student could have committed suicide, and yet

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Speaker 3: we were still waiting for the education department to come

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Speaker 3: and let us know much.

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Speaker 1: It's a pretty frightening situation really, because as we know,

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Speaker 1: you know, I like I. I'm sure that a situation

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Speaker 1: like that is not an isolated one. We have got

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Speaker 1: kids that do desperately need that support.

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Speaker 3: Yes, and we need counselors in schools, but we need

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Speaker 3: them to start in the primary schools as well. There

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Speaker 3: I don't think there's any counselors in primary schools at all. Yes,

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Speaker 3: we do have one that goes around, but she doesn't

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Speaker 3: have time to go to the primary school. At the moment,

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Speaker 3: we have no counselors in our primary school I believe

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Speaker 3: in the Northern suburbs. And yet we have to go

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Speaker 3: through that Tree Arch system and maybe get a counselor

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Speaker 3: out within twenty four hours, which is too late, Katie,

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Speaker 3: way too late. I actually think we actually had a

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Speaker 3: meeting with the CEO, Karen Weston Watson, sorry Watson. She

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Speaker 3: actually told us in that meeting that if we do

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Speaker 3: want to counselor for those schools, they have to fund

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Speaker 3: it out in their own profits. Goodness, we no funding

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Speaker 3: has decreased for all our schools to get rid of

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Speaker 3: one of our teachers. We could fund a counselor.

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Speaker 2: Mark This seems like a much bigger issue.

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Speaker 1: I think then probably a lot of people realized from

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Speaker 1: the outset when we started having this discussion a bit

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Speaker 1: earlier in the week.

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Speaker 2: You know, based on the discussions.

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Speaker 1: That we are having, it sounds as though Sanderson Middle

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Speaker 1: School sort of already has the model operating that you

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Speaker 1: know that we spoke to the department about, so that

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Speaker 1: school counselor is already roving between Sanderson and four other schools.

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Speaker 1: But what is your response to the department's new model

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Speaker 1: that they have flagged, and do you think it's going

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Speaker 1: to work.

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Speaker 3: No, I don't think it's going to work. We have

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Speaker 3: the highest rate of youse suicide in Australia and we're

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Speaker 3: actually taking a model from other states and territories. I

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Speaker 3: know for a fact, I've got friends in Victoria that

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Speaker 3: they've actually put stool based counselors back into their primary schools,

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Speaker 3: back into their schools because they knew that this funding

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Speaker 3: model does not work. I got off the phone this

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Speaker 3: morning to one of my friends down in Victoria who

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Speaker 3: actually told me that, yes, as of this week, they've

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Speaker 3: got school based counselors back into their schools because they

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Speaker 3: knew that the having centralized was not going to work.

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Speaker 3: I just want to touch on a couple of other things.

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Speaker 3: Is confidentiality. The biggest thing is where's the confidentiality in

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Speaker 3: these students going to the Mittell Center. So we put

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Speaker 3: in a form so the teacher gets to know, then

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Speaker 3: maybe the principal, because the principle normally sends it off.

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Speaker 3: Then you've got the person who receives the information, and

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Speaker 3: then they put it in a database and then one

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Speaker 3: of five apparently five or three educators will have a

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Speaker 3: look at it, and then they it's a tree yard

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Speaker 3: system where they go, Okay, this one's a red, this

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Speaker 3: one's an orange, and this one's are green. So the

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Speaker 3: green ones can wait a week, the orange ones can

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Speaker 3: wait a couple of days that we have to get

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Speaker 3: to the red one. What kind of system counseling system

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Speaker 3: actually works like that?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you're right, I mean, the point you're making is

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Speaker 1: an incredibly good one. There's no confidentiality in that situation

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Speaker 1: for a kid that's potentially suffering, and you know it's

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Speaker 1: then going through all those two front steps before they

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Speaker 1: actually get to the point of actually seeing a counselor.

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Speaker 2: Look, this whole situation is it's unbelievable.

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Speaker 1: Really, it's a huge It does sound like it's a

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Speaker 1: huge concern. I mean we've spoken, of course, to the

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Speaker 1: department a little bit earlier this morning. They spoke about

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Speaker 1: just how many counselors we've got. So these thirty school

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Speaker 1: council excuse me positions, twenty one of those are currently filled,

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Speaker 1: three are going to be filled by the end of May,

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Speaker 1: and six of those are still under recruitment. Now mark

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Speaker 1: correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe we've got

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Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty two government schools in the Northern Territory.

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Speaker 1: Those numbers don't seem to stack.

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Speaker 3: Up, No, they definitely don't. I remember when my first child.

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Speaker 3: I've got four daughters, May one of them has just

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Speaker 3: finished school, yep. One of them's in the high school,

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Speaker 3: one's in the middle school, and one in a prime

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Speaker 3: So I can actually see the whole progression of this.

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Speaker 3: When my eldest daughter was at school, she was going

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Speaker 3: through some bullyings and we actually had a school counselor

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Speaker 3: that was brilliant, absolutely brilliant. And then I found out

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Speaker 3: later that they've been taken away from the primary schools

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Speaker 3: and put into a little bit of a hub of

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Speaker 3: Sanderson where they are feeder schools, and then we're getting

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Speaker 3: so many problems. The biggest, the biggest thing that I've got, Katie,

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Speaker 3: is if you start early, you can actually get on

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Speaker 3: top of it. You know, when we look at crime,

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Speaker 3: when we look at mental health, when we look at

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Speaker 3: all that, if we start in our primary schools and

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Speaker 3: we can actually see it in our primary schools, we

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Speaker 3: can actually get help to them a little bit quicker.

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Speaker 3: Than Oh, they've just come into middle senior school and

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Speaker 3: now we're having problems. There is an eighteen month wait

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Speaker 3: to see a psychiatrist. I believe there's also an eighteen

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Speaker 3: month wait to see a pediatrician. We're actually lucky at Sanderson.

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Speaker 3: We've actually got a doctor, a pediatrician that is actually

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Speaker 3: donating his time. Wow, I believe once a month just

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Speaker 3: to help our students out or a legend.

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Speaker 2: What an absolute legend.

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Speaker 3: Else we're going to have to have pay for that

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Speaker 3: out of our budget as well. He's absolutely a brilliant,

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Speaker 3: brilliant pediatrician that's helping us out. And he didn't actually

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Speaker 3: realize how extensive all this stuff is.

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Speaker 1: Mark, I am going to have to get ready to

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Speaker 1: wrap up. I really appreciate you sort of giving us

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Speaker 1: that perspective certainly, you know when you talk about the

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Speaker 1: model and and just how many different schools some of

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Speaker 1: the counselors are already looking after, and in terms of

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Speaker 1: that weightless time as well, that it probably is providing

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Speaker 1: a lot of our listeners perspective that they simply would

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Speaker 1: not have had previously. I know, even for myself and

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Speaker 1: I am a parent, and yeah, I just had no

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Speaker 1: idea that in some situations you've got kids waiting up

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Speaker 1: to six weeks to actually see a school counselor and

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Speaker 1: the process that they need to go through, even if

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Speaker 1: it is an emergency.

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Speaker 3: Yes, And can I just complete by saying that if

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Speaker 3: we do put it into a centralized hub, which I

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Speaker 3: believe the Education Department could not answer today. But I

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Speaker 3: know that there are some that are going into a

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Speaker 3: centralized hub, and I've got on good authority that they're

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Speaker 3: going to be doing this with all our counselors. But

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Speaker 3: I'm hoping that you know, we can all band together.

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Speaker 3: We can all talk to our local MLAs, send them

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Speaker 3: a letter asking them to keep our counselor there. But

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Speaker 3: the biggest problem that I have is if the Education

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Speaker 3: Department was very serious about the well being of our students,

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Speaker 3: they would put counselors in each of the primary schools,

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Speaker 3: in each of the middle schools, and the high schools. Said,

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Speaker 3: I know, in twenty seventeen, you just need a degree

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Speaker 3: in counseling, Well they change that to having a degree

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Speaker 3: in social what was it social in basically psychology and

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Speaker 3: social work, which actually got rid of a fair bit

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Speaker 3: of our counselors, so they weren't allowed to have a

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Speaker 3: degree in counseling, so it had to be social work

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Speaker 3: or psychology where the counseling, especially in a degree of counseling,

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Speaker 3: they will be able to push the student onto a

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Speaker 3: lot more help as well. So why don't we start

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Speaker 3: with that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, look, I actually think it seems like a

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Speaker 1: sensible idea. I'm not an expert in that space, but

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Speaker 1: it seems like a sense sable idea. Mark. I really

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Speaker 1: appreciate your time this morning. Thank you so much for

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Speaker 1: having a chat with us.

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Speaker 3: More than happy to talk to you. Thank you, you

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Speaker 3: and your listeners.

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Speaker 2: No worries at all,