Risks in Vulnerable Ages: Identifying Metal Health Problems of at-Risk Student through the School Guidance System

Due to the youth mental problem rate growth rapidly in recent year, the Taiwan government approved the “Student Guidance and Counseling Act” in 2014 commanding schools to increase number of counselors and according to the three stage structure of preventive counseling to establish a risk reduction guidance system accessible to all students. The system is based on the framework of clinical risk management that needs to cooperate with social workers, psychologists and psychiatrists. Each discipline has different jurisdictions defining “At-risk”. The research is concerned with the topic “What juvenile behavior would be problematic concerning at-risk students and how the guidance system treats the students’ mental health problems after classifying them as “abnormal”.” The first step of the research focused on the analysis of the manuals used by the counselors, guidebooks issued by the Ministry of Education etc. The study examines how these materials define “at-risk students” and what kind of intervention strategies these materials propose. Furthermore, the researcher selected one counseling office at secondary school where she worked as volunteer for three months in order to understand the everyday practice of the counseling office and to investigate how the teachers identify and help at-risk students. The major result reveal that the social classification such as foreign-born Taiwanese, indigenous youth, single parent-hood, low-income family, domestic violence are easier to identify as the at-risk student. Also, student who has the behavior such as lying, bullying, impolite to teachers could be the indicator of the priority list of teacher guidance. In short, the findings indicate the types of the social orders that the Taiwanese society tends to sustain.