The pandemic has accelerated digitalisation in every industry and profession, including the counselling world. Since COVID-19 struck, counselling professionals swiftly turned to technology and pivoted to tele-counselling and online therapy for fast, on-demand delivery of virtual treatments to cope with the heavy caseload.
To commemorate the Master of Counselling (MCOU) programme's 12th anniversary, SUSS organised a webinar entitled “Creative & Ethical Use of Technology in Counselling Post COVID-19” on 18 June 2022 to uncover the directions and challenges of using technology in counselling children, adolescents, couples, and families in dealing with issues related to addictions, conflicts, grief, mental health challenges, clinical supervision, in schools and at work settings in the post-pandemic environment.
Participants at the “Creative & Ethical Use of Technology in Counselling Post COVID-19” webinar.
Professor Cheong Hee Kiat, SUSS President, opened the webinar by reaffirming SUSS' commitment in training counsellors: "SUSS remains committed and ready to enhance our counselling programmes to support the learning needs of future generations of professionals passionate who desire to enter this highly demanded and demanding field. Some new courses we will introduce to our current offering include Telehealth and Online Counselling, Couple and Family Therapy, and Bereavement Counselling."
.png?sfvrsn=7eca1f09_2 "Professor Cheong Hee Kiat, SUSS President, addressing the participants at the webinar.")
Professor Cheong Hee Kiat, SUSS President, addressing the participants at the webinar.
Dr Maliki Osman, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, Second Minister for Education & Foreign Affairs, who was Guest-of-Honour at the webinar, shared in his address: "As this is an emerging sector of need, programmes such as SUSS MCOU provide a valuable talent pipeline to grow the requisite manpower. I hope that SUSS' MCOU can prove to not only be a valuable talent pipeline for this emerging sector, but also a strong pillar that practitioners and researchers can rely on with the rapid changes to the field that is to come."
Dr Maliki Osman, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, Second Minister for Education & Foreign Affairs, was invited as Guest-of-Honour for the webinar.
Over 200 participants attended the webinar which saw a distinguished panel of local experts who discussed on pertinent issues related to the creative and ethical use of technology with different clientele, followed by ten 60-minute breakout workshops to further deliberate salient issues.