With the declaration of CBSE and ICSE board results for class 10th and 12th, students are seeking help from several helpline numbers and counseling centers in the city to battle their depression, stress, anxiety regarding their future and other such issues fueled by low percentage or poor performance.
These centers are an effective platform in providing aid and to help people especially teenagers and adolescents in coming out and talking about their problems as Ashish Soy, a city based psychiatrist said.
“Majority of the student callers, who have scored less marks are keen to know about what consequences this will have in their future or will they be able to get into good colleges. In the phase of increasing competition, they have become victims of constant peer pressure and parents to perform well,” said Soy.
With the intention of helping people deal with psychiatric issues, a 24 hour telephone helpline number was started by Central Institute of Psychiatry (CIP) in May 2001that provided telephonic counseling. Associate professor of Clinical Psychology, CIP, Ranchi, Neha Sayeed said that they have received more calls in their helpline number, prior to the announcement of results as compared to after the announcement.
“The callers that we received were students dealing with anxiety of results. Their anxiety is often caused by the fear of not being able to fulfill the expectations of others. In order to help them deal with it, we recommend the parents to not leave the child alone and increase communication with them. However, since not everything can be dealt with over a telephonic conversation, in extreme cases we prefer calling the student for personal sessions,” added Sayeed.
“The school is not ignorant of the fact that the students are working under lots of pressure. To help students deal with such pressure and talk freely about anything that has been bothering them, the school has provided them with an excellent counselor,” said Ram Singh, principle, Delhi Public School, Ranchi.
“Ever since the results have been declared, some students who have performed poorly have come up to me and expressed their problems. I always tell them that this result is not the end but a very minute part of a long journey. We don’t always get what we want and there is always scope to improve,” he added.
Omi Singh who is a counselor with DPS, Ranchi said, “In spite of the school’s good performance in the boards, there were some students that came to me. They were suffering from low self-confidence as they felt that they were not able to fulfill certain expectations. Certain students had also complained specifically about scoring low in English and hoped that CBSE would conduct a re-evaluation”.
Neena Agarwal, clinical psychologist, Onkar Astha said, “Students who perform poorly in the exams are more prone to develop depression. The parents play an extremely important role during this phase and they should motivate their children and help them in building their confidence”.