Comprehensive Student Guidance, “School as a Team,” and Partnerships with Families and Communities

As bullying, school refusal, and other student-guidance challenges grow, attention is also focusing on the increasingly demanding working conditions of teachers. Comprehensive student guidance has the potential to improve these conditions while deepening collaboration with families and local communities.

• Today’s School Reality
• Teacher Workload and “School as a Team”
• Points to Note for “School as a Team”
• Comprehensive Student-Guidance Initiatives
• The Multi-Level Approach (MLA) Program
• Cooperation with Parents and Local Residents is Important
• How Collaboration Is Conceived in the United States
• Community Partnerships and MLA
• A Starting Point for Understanding and Trust

Today’s School Reality

In recent years, there is a broad perception that student-guidance challenges have worsened. First, bullying has generally increased in both elementary and junior high schools. It temporarily declined around FY2020 (during pandemic-related closures) but began rising again around FY2022. School refusal has also grown faster since around FY2017, and from FY2020 onward even more students have refused to attend due to the pandemic’s effects (文部科学省, 2023a).

At the same time, teachers responsible for addressing these issues face intensifying workload. Educational activities are more diverse and unpredictable, and the traditional model in which individual teachers personally handle each student’s issues has reached its limits.

Consider the reality of long working hours. According to the "Survey on Teachers’ Working Conditions (FY2022)", the combined total of time at school plus take-home work time on weekdays averaged 11 hours 23 minutes in elementary schools and 11 hours 33 minutes in junior high schools. On weekends, the totals were 1 hour 12 minutes (elementary) and 3 hours 7 minutes (junior high) (文部科学省, 2023b). Given the statutory eight-hour workday under the Labor Standards Act, these hours are far from short.

Source: Source: Compiled by the author based on the MEXT's "Survey on Teachers’ Working Conditions (FY2022)" (文部科学省『教員勤務実態調査（令和４年度）』).

Teacher Workload and “School as a Team”

Teachers’ psychological burden is also said to be increasing. Yoshioka (吉岡, 2020) groups the causes of teacher workload into three factors: (1) Changes among children, parents/guardians, and society, (2) Factors originating with teachers themselves, and (3) Factors stemming from policies of MEXT and boards of education. 

Briefly: (1) refers to the decline in the educational capacity of families and communities—rooted in falling social capital—and the resulting pressure on schools as the “last bastion.” (2) includes lifestyle shifts that emphasize personal life and a decline in collegiality as mid-career teachers—once the backbone of school operations—grow fewer, making it harder to support one another’s growth. (3) points to the mismatch between the fixed, immovable schedule (classes, meetings, etc.) and new tasks added in the name of “educational reform,” leaving teachers unable to process the workload.

According to Yoshioka (吉岡, 2020), these factors have generated a vague anxiety, burden, and sense of impasse around “work that never ends,” producing isolation and pressure in relationships with students and parents/guardians—and ultimately futility and powerlessness. As a result, more teachers have suffered burnout and mental health issues (吉岡, 2020).

Source: Compiled by the author based on Yoshioka (吉岡, 2020).

Against this backdrop, the shift to “School as a Team” has been discussed since the Central Council for Education’s 2015 report, On the Ideal of Schools as Teams and Future Improvements. The idea is to address the increasingly difficult, complex, and diverse problems schools face—and the paradox of overburdened teachers who must respond to them—by bringing other professionals into schools. This also challenges the traditional view that teachers must do everything.

Points to Note for “School as a Team”

However, simply stationing other professionals in schools does not automatically reduce teacher burden or enhance school functions. To function well, school social workers and other specialists need a process with the teaching staff to build mutual understanding of professional roles.

For example, Suzuki, Harada, Ida, and Ito (鈴木・原田・伊田・伊藤, 2019) argue that school social workers should be clearly positioned as quasi-staff and that schools need clear guidelines on case-conference membership, goals, and modalities. Kurihara (栗原, 2017c) further contends that while education remains central, teams must integrate psychology/welfare perspectives and management; without teachers at the core, “School as a Team” cannot function effectively.

In short, teaching staffs are required to welcome other professions on the premise of difference, while also anchoring themselves in educational expertise to address shared problems. In effect, schools must acquire new expertise in collaboration itself.

Comprehensive Student-Guidance Initiatives

Given today’s context, schools need to solve student-guidance issues, improve teachers’ time and mental constraints, and make collaboration with welfare and other professionals work—all in parallel.

A promising response is Japan’s comprehensive student-guidance program, the Multi-Level Approach (MLA), developed by Professor Shinji Kurihara and colleagues at Hiroshima University. Building on comprehensive approaches to counseling and student guidance developed overseas (especially in the U.S.), MLA aims for whole-person development for all students, basing itself on psychosocial development while keeping academic and career development in view (栗原, 2017a).

At the same time, MLA provides a structured training system to enhance individual teacher capacity, cultivating the skills needed to collaborate with colleagues on student guidance with clear foresight.

Source:Compiled by the author based on Yamazaki (山崎, 2019).

According to Yamazaki (山崎, 2019), student guidance in MLA is organized into three tiers by purpose: Primary: for all students—“build the capacity to do things independently.” Secondary: also for all students—“build the capacity to support one another as peers.” Tertiary: for students with greater support needs—“teachers and specialists lead support.” The program emphasizes prevention, strengthening primary and secondary efforts so as to minimize the need for tertiary interventions.

The Multi-Level Approach (MLA) Program

MLA features four core programs designed with classroom-group development in mind (山崎, 2019): In primary guidance: Social and Emotional Learning (SEL)—focusing on growth in individual social competencies and agency. In secondary guidance: Cooperative Learning and Peer Support—leveraging students’ relational strengths to foster group growth. Across primary to tertiary: PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports)—cultivating valued behaviors through positive interventions.

Teachers who attend MLA training experience these programs themselves. To acquire the skills needed for Cooperative Learning, SEL, and Peer Support, they engage not only in lectures but also in exercises, discussions, and reflection. In other words, the training itself becomes a venue for cooperative learning, SEL, and peer support, where participants deepen insights and learn skills together (栗原, 2017b). Through training, faculties learn to embody “teamness”—emotional connectedness, shared ideals/goals/policies, and role division (栗原, 2017b).

Training also has levels: beyond classroom practice, it cultivates leaders within schools. Mid-career teachers (e.g., chief teachers) are developed as middle leaders with a student-counseling perspective, able to observe students, and at the right timing connect them to other professionals or agencies. Such leaders “weave networks daily, continually gather information, and seek the right timing and support methods” (大畑, 2017).

Thus MLA is designed not only to improve student-guidance skills but also to restore weakened collegiality—both a cause of intensifying workload and a prerequisite for “School as a Team.” In this sense, it is well suited to today’s school reality.

Partnering with Parents and Community Residents

If we aim to solve student-guidance problems at the root, collaboration with parents/guardians and the community is essential—so that the educational messages children receive are consistent across school, home, and community.

The key, then, is how to build partnership and the mutual trust that lubricates it. Tsuyuguchi (露口, 2012) finds that regular updates from schools about efforts and outcomes in learning environments, teacher competence, and school improvement increase parents’ positive evaluations of schools. He also finds that parents’ participation in parent networks and diverse community networks is associated with greater trust in schools (露口, 2012). Hence, the best approach is for schools to share activities with parents while supporting the formation of parent networks.

How Collaboration Is Conceived in the United States

How does parental involvement deepen? In the U.S., where school–parent–community collaboration is robust, parent involvement is thought to deepen through four stages (Stefanski et al., 2016):

1. Coordination with Families and Agencies: the basic form—ensuring students and families can access not only education but also health and social services.

2. Schools that Provide Comprehensive Services: maintaining access to foundational services while parents participate in school events and volunteer. 

3. Community Schools that Provide Comprehensive Services: decision-making grows more democratic; parents and community members are regarded as equal participants.

4. Community Development: schools become not only places for intellectual growth and service delivery but also venues where parents and community members discuss and address local issues.

Through these stages, school–parent–community collaboration progresses.

Source: Compiled by the author from Stefanski et al. (2016).

Community Partnerships and MLA

A comprehensive approach like MLA can also spark collaboration with parents and communities.

Soja City, Okayama Prefecture, launched the project “Creating Schools Everyone Wants to Attend” in FY2010 by adopting MLA—and achieved notable outcomes. The junior-high school non-attendance rate fell from 3.63% at program start to 1.63% in FY2016 (Soja City website/ 総社市ホームページ). The number of junior-high students arrested or taken into custody by police declined from 205 cases in FY2009 to 7 cases in FY2015.

In this project, PBIS served as an entry point for parent and community involvement. PBIS aims to teach valued behaviors, and those values are decided with parents and the community. In Soja, when defining values to teach children, the city surveyed about 8,000 parents across preschools/kindergartens, elementary schools, and junior highs. A committee—including parents, the Chamber of Commerce, the police, lead child-welfare volunteers, and experts—then deliberated and finalized the value items (Soja City Board of Education, 2015/ 総社市教育委員会, 2015). The values were publicized to residents, who were encouraged to praise children when they practiced valued behaviors in the community and to report such instances to schools (Soja City Board of Education, 2015/ 総社市教育委員会, 2015). The initiative is said to be positively regarded by residents.

A Starting Point for Understanding and Trust

In Soja’s case, the burden on parents and residents was not heavy, and the project served as a catalyst for understanding school efforts. In this sense, MLA can be a starting point for mutual trust.

Source: Compiled by the author

Comprehensive approaches like MLA make it easier for schools/teachers and parents/community to share goals centered on improving student guidance. Because the relationship is reciprocal—not one side supporting and the other being supported—there is room to grow into genuine collaboration.

As Japan considers future home–school–community partnerships, it is vital to deepen discussion grounded in comprehensive approaches like MLA.

(Published with additions and revisions in the February 2024 issue of "EN-ICHI FORUM")

References

• 大畑祐司（2017）「三次的生徒指導の実際―教育相談的視点をもったミドルリーダーの重要性」栗原慎二編著『マルチレベルアプローチ　だれもが行きたくなる学校づくり―日本版包括的生徒指導の理論と実践』ほんの森出版、pp.132-137.
• 栗原慎二（2017a）「マルチレベルアプローチって、何ですか？」栗原慎二編著『マルチレベルアプローチ　だれもが行きたくなる学校づくり―日本版包括的生徒指導の理論と実践』ほんの森出版、pp.7-24.
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