‘Limited resources, cultural practices limiting students’

Limited resources and cultural practices are the two main factors identified as barriers to the success of middle and high school students in the CNMI.

This was the consensus of participants of last week’s 2nd Annual Counselors’ Conference. The gathering also emphasized the need to explore all avenues to meet the required and expected services to the students.

Leo Pangelinan, program manager at Northern Marianas College’s Access Challenge Project, said it is one of the event’s objectives to help counselors understand specific student population and help them enrich themselves to better serve the group.

There were over 50 participants in the event that was addressed by licensed psychologist Ron Meister, who served as the event’s main speaker.

Pangelinan disclosed that culture was a notable barrier identified in the progress of students as shared by counselors.

“Some family members have different roles depending on their place in the family unit. If you’re the eldest, you usually do take more responsibilities that sometimes limit your ability to focus on school or school endeavors because they have familiar roles entirely separate from their being as a student,” Pangelinan said.

In a presentation by Jennifer Furey-Maratita of the Community Guidance Center, she focused her discussion on the “barriers to success among Pacific island students.”

Counselors were also taught guidelines on working with at-risk students and understanding the referral process.

To motivate students to a career after high school, Tyce Mister of Marianas High School’s Cooperative Education program gave valuable steps for counselors to effectively guide students and clients.

Meister, meanwhile, hopes to see a resolution to the limited resources provided to school counselors.

“I think the challenge counselors have on Saipan is [they are] hugely understaffed that in a lot of ways, the successful treatment of clients is not met,” he said.

Meister said exploring possible grants to sustain these needs must be aggressively supported.

In his presentation about helping others and healing self, Meister said, “We have capable people here on island. We do all have the education and experience to help others and we need to continue educating ourselves. We need to continue look to science as well to find out what the research is so we can be informed as practitioners to provide the best treatment possible.”

The licensed psychologist lauded the NMC’s effort of organizing the conference, through federal grant.

He encouraged the community and the agencies to continue extend assistance to better enhance the services provided by counselors.