Aileen Little talks to Margaret Jarvie about counselling, its

development, and its new-found status as a social service

'IT has been very rewarding, full of excitement and stimulation, and

it has helped me in my personal growth.'' Thus Margaret Jarvie, course

leader in guidance and coun-

selling at Moray House College of Education in Edinburgh, sums up

rather enviably a career of over 40 years in counselling, 24 of them on

the staff of Moray House.

She is no small way responsible for the status counselling now enjoys

as a publicly acknowledged social service. The product of a

working-class upbringing in Motherwell, this mother of two's first

experience of helping others to help themselves arose when she and her

husband started a church club for young marrieds. A newly-wed herself

and sensitive to marital teething troubles, she enlisted in a training

scheme in 1955 and became the youngest marriage guidance counsellor in

Scotland. Subsequently she became one of the Scottish Marriage Guidance

Council's first educational tutors.

Going into schools was significant. ''I was shocked in the early

sixties by the gap between what youngsters wanted and what school heads

thought they knew,'' Mrs Jarvie recalled. Some heads wanted classes

''processed'' in two-hour slots, resulting in a solemn commitment from

pupils never to engage in pre-marital sex! Mrs Jarvie's developmental

work culminated in the establishment of a pioneering

nursery-to-further-education programme.

But ideally, she believes personal relationships are too important to

be relegated to outsiders, and should be built into the school

curriculum. While working on a sociology degree at Edinburgh University

(''I thought educators would listen more if I was a teacher'') she noted

with approval the establishment of the guidance system in Scottish

schools. Happy with the framework, Jarvie remains dissatisfied with the

handling of the ''personal'' aspects of guidance. ''A lot of guidance

teachers are still untrained and, anyway, every teacher should play a

role.''

The difference between the kind of counselling practised in schools

and that practised by professionals is a matter of depth and training.

It is the difference between a counselling approach and real

counselling. Mrs Jarvie said the former is applied by a wide variety of

people (lawyers, bankers, shop assistants, doctors, even journalists) to

establish rapport with the public. But it does little more than scratch

the surface.

Amateurs fail to recognise, for instance, the difference between

neurotic and psychotic behaviour. They do not always know when to refer.

And there can be conflicts of interest.

Suppose a professional counsellor has a schoolboy client who believes

his best course of action lies in truancy. Mrs Jarvie explained: ''In

that situation, after taking him through the implications, I would see

it as my job to accept it, even support it.'' Were she wearing a

guidance teacher's hat her profession would make compliance impossible.

But nor should the role of professional counsellor be held up

necessarily as exemplary. In the voluntary sector standards vary

alarmingly, a situation Mrs Jarvie hopes the recently-formed

Confederation of Scottish Counselling Agencies will help to address.

Scotland's academic institutions have only recently begun to offer

training in counselling and Mrs Jarvie derives particular satisfaction

from the fact that Moray House was the first to offer a post-graduate

diploma in guidance for teachers, and the first (thanks to her efforts)

to establish an award-bearing course on counselling for people such as

welfare officers, nurses, and managers. Officially, Mrs Jarvie retires

in September. Unofficially, Moray House may buy in her services until

the first post-graduate diploma students finish in a year.

Her expertise is also sought outside the lecture theatre. She is

counselling consultant to the Bank of Scotland, among others, and heads

the team which helps its employees to come to terms with traumatic bank

raids. She is an external examiner for the Central School of Counselling

and Therapy in London, and for two universities. Without false modesty,

she reckons she does the work of at least two people -- and it takes its

toll. Even counsellors need to be counselled. Guidelines recommend they

submit to one hour as client for every eight as therapist. It is an

opportunity to unload which she clearly values.

Apart from a wish to see better accreditation -- anyone can set up as

a counsellor -- Mrs Jarvie has every faith in her chosen profession.

Being slightly sceptical about the business, I told her about a recent

interview with an actress who confessed, after trying every therapy in

the book, to finding life all the better for taking matters into her own

hands. It had dawned on her to stop relying on others. Mrs Jarvie is

unfazed by comments like this. She agreed: ''Only we ourselves can solve

our problems.'' But, she added: ''Without counselling, the actress might

never have reached that stage of awareness.''