Crime in Trinidad & To­ba­go will per­sist un­less coun­sel­lors are placed in all schools to as­sist vul­ner­a­ble chil­dren par­tic­u­lar­ly boys, says Founder of In­ter­na­tion­al Men’s Day Dr Jerome Teelucks­ingh.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia in ob­ser­va­tion of the In­ter­na­tion­al Day of the Boy Child, Teelucks­ingh said the biggest chal­lenge fac­ing boys are a lack of prop­er role mod­els with­in the home, schools and com­mu­ni­ty.

He said a prop­er­ly mon­i­tored men­tor­ing pro­gramme should be launched in all com­mu­ni­ties, es­pe­cial­ly those where there are fa­ther­less chil­dren.

“This has to be mon­i­tored prop­er­ly and as­sessed be­cause we don’t want to know there is a men­tor­ing pro­gramme where boys are phys­i­cal­ly or sex­u­al­ly abused,” he said.

Teelucks­ingh added: “We al­so need to have guid­ance coun­sel­lors in every school.

“We have schools with tech­nol­o­gy and smart boards and lap­top but they don’t have coun­sel­lors and teach­ers don’t have the time to coun­sel chil­dren who are be­ing bul­lied. We need ther­a­pists and peer coun­sel­lors.

“Just as they im­port nurs­es, we should think about im­port­ing coun­sel­lors for all schools. That should be a pri­or­i­ty,” Teelucks­ingh added.

He said boys were un­der­achiev­ing.

“It seems many of our boys do not want to ap­pear to be stu­dious be­cause they will be bul­lied,” Teelucks­ingh said.

“Some­where along the jour­ney from boy­hood to man­hood, boys are so­cialised not to ex­press the nat­ur­al and spon­ta­neous re­ac­tions to spir­i­tu­al, phys­i­cal, emo­tion­al, and psy­cho­log­i­cal pain, dis­ap­point­ment, and re­jec­tion.

“They are so­cialised to equate strength and mas­culin­i­ty with sup­press­ing their nat­ur­al and spon­ta­neous re­ac­tion to pain, dis­ap­point­ment, and re­jec­tion; not ask­ing for help; and shun­ning vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty,” he added.

In ob­ser­vance of “World Day Of The Boy Child” to be held on May 16, 2020--Teelucks­ingh said the theme will be “Em­pow­er­ing, guid­ing and pro­vid­ing role mod­els for a peace­ful world.”

Teelucks­ingh said the Or­ga­ni­za­tion for Eco­nom­ic Co­op­er­a­tion and De­vel­op­ment not­ed that boys glob­al­ly are aca­d­e­m­i­cal­ly un­der­per­form­ing. He said sev­er­al sug­ges­tions were made to as­sist boy chil­dren.

These in­clude form­ing part­ner­ships with ed­u­ca­tors, school ad­min­is­tra­tors, law en­force­ment pro­fes­sion­als, le­gal pro­fes­sion­als, health­care pro­fes­sion­als and providers, so­cial ser­vices pro­fes­sion­als and providers, par­ents, leg­is­la­tors, busi­ness lead­ers, and Fa­ther­hood and Men’s Is­sues ad­vo­cates and prac­ti­tion­ers.

Rec­om­men­da­tions were al­so made to em­ploy male ed­u­ca­tors and ad­min­is­tra­tors in schools and com­mu­ni­ties that have Fa­ther­less house­holds or house­holds de­void of a dom­i­nant male pres­ence.