Counseling Services for Students, Undiksha Moves Through Peer Tutors

Singaraja- Students’ life is very vulnerable to problems, ranging from academic/study, social, personal, and even career. This has the potential to be an obstacle to the continuation of the study. Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha (Undiksha) pays serious attention to this issue. Efforts to handle and provide solutions are carried out with counseling services. This service movement was expanded through peer tutors fronted by the Technical Implementation Unit for Counseling Services (BK).

Peer tutoring is an annual routine programme by the Undiksha BK Services UPT. In 2022, there are hundreds of students participating. These students are not only from the Counseling Guidance Study Program, but also others. Before being appointed as peer tutors, on Wednesday (6/22/2022), the students were given training in the basics of counseling by two experts, Undiksha academic, Putu Rahayu Ujiti, S.Psi., M.Psi., Psychologist and a laboratory school teacher of Undiksha, Adek Kurniawan Saputra, M.Pd.

The Head of the Undiksha BK Services UPT, Dewi Arum Widhiyanti Metra Putri, S.Psi., M.A., said peer tutors are an extension of the BK Services UPT to be able to provide guidance and counseling services with a wider reach. This follows an increasing number of Undiksha students and a limited number of consuls at the BK Service UPT. “The consular staff at the BK Service UPT, I think with a number of only eight to nine people, will not be optimal in providing counseling and guidance services to all Undiksha students in need,” she explained.

The lecturer, who is familiarly called Arum, said that Undiksha students who had quite a number of problems were identified from academic supervisors, peer tutors or those who came directly to ask for consultation or counseling services from the UPT BK Service. Most of the problems are related to learning such as decreased motivation and enthusiasm. There are also other problems related to social and career.

The presence of peer tutors in each study program is expected to provide solutions to these problems. Students can also contact these peer tutors directly to request consulting services. “Peer tutors will be introduced to their respective faculties. From there, we expect proactive students to be able to contact directly when there is a problem,” she said.

Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs and Cooperation Undiksha, Dr. Gede Rasben Dantes, S.T., M.T.I., in his opening remarks gave appreciation to students who participated as peer tutors. He said that peer tutors are one of the media to build collaboration skills, communication skills, creative thinking, critical thinking, compassion, and computational thinking in this 4.0 revolution era. “We need to know that we can’t get all of this in the classroom in the teaching and learning process. I think peer tutoring is a way of how we build this 6C,” he said.

He further stated that the essence of being a university, especially for Undiksha, is that it must be able to produce graduates who are superior, competent, have strong characters, and are creative. In addition, it is not only able to find a job, but the most important thing is to create a job. Realizing that the role of UPT BK and peer tutors are important to foster student enthusiasm in studying and working.

In addition to training, peer tutors are also officially appointed. This moment is a sign of readiness to provide guidance and counseling services to students. (lpsy)

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