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Wanting to be a youth drug counsellor, where do I start?

peterpan_99

peterpan_99

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Joined
Apr 17, 2005
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I'm seriously thinking of becoming a youth drug counsellor in Victoria. After experiences last year with helping my best mate through a serious needle addiction I found that I surprised myself with the strength that come from inside me, the understanding and most importantly the patience I had.

If there are any of you out there that are in the profession, can you give me some guidance as to what exact qualifications I require? I'd much rather a TAFE course over Uni, been currently eyeing off a Diploma of Counselling and Communication course through Australian College of Applied Psychology. Not sure what counselling courses, if any, are out there specific to working with "youth" and "drugs and alcohol"

Many thanks :)
 
I work part-time at Turning point alcohol and drug centre, so have just asked one of my colleagues there for advice for you... I don't know that side of things so well myself.
 
im studyin addiction studies at uni you can be a youth counsellor with this course i believe
 
EmuBitter said:
im studyin addiction studies at uni you can be a youth counsellor with this course i believe
Click to expand...

Which Uni are you at?

I studied the same course.
 
Good on you, particularly if you are male. From what I understand there is a scarcity of male social workers, and a lot of teenage boys want to speak with one rather than a woman. So you shouldn't have much trouble finding a job, etc.


I don't think you'd need to do a uni degree. Why not contact somewhere you'd like to work in the future and ask them? I think they'd be very helpful.

Another thing you could consider is volunteering to be a Lifeline telephone counsellor, they train you -

# Approximately 80 hours of face-to-face training (usually once a week over a period of 16-20 weeks)
# Supervised practical telephone counselling sessions (approx 30 hours)

and then off you go :) I was thinking of doing it myself but realised I am too affected by other people's emotions and I think it would stress me out and bring me down.

There's also Directline, which is the same sort of thing as Lifeline, but do with drug problems.

I hope I helped in some way.
 
It depends where you want to work. To work in government, you really need to have a uni degree (specifically social work or psychology) and more and more these days, some kind of post graduate study as well (either counselling / therapy or addiction studies or equivalent).

Whatever course you decide on, the most important thing you'll do will be field placements. They can teach you whatever they like in the classroom, it's really once you're out there in the field that you learn the real tricks of the trade. The Social Work degree is good for this because there are two pracs, that go for 16 - 18 weeks each.

Drop me a PM if you want to know more about the ins and outs of the work.
 
Hi peterpan_99 , I'd reccomend a TAFE course to start with. Try one of the certificates to see if it's right for you. If you really love it maybe go on to social work at uni. Also you might want to try volunteering for an organization like Lifeline. You get free training in all kinds of counselling as well as experience in the industry which will look good on a CV.
 
The Victorian Department of Human Services has a minimum qualification requirement for AOD workers.

This is a Cert IV in Alcohol and Other Drug Work OR a tertiary qualification in a related field (health, social or behavioural science) PLUS 4 competencies from the Cert IV in AOD Work.

So your best bet is to enrol in a Cert IV in AOD work. There are a number of TAFE providers (NMIT and RMIT I think), plus some other providers - Odyssey House for example.

Turning Point does offer free training in some of the competencies to people already working in the sector - but that's no use to you I imagine.

Currently VU offers both Cert IV and Diploma in Youth Work - that's not AOD specific but should allow you to start work in the field, providing you commit to doing any extra competencies...
 
become an addict and get to feel what its 'really' like - no amount of study will give you that education!
 
^ Many of my professional colleagues have done just that - and also done tertiary study. Can't beat the combination of theory and experience :)

.. and you don't need to be (or have been) an addict to be a good worker in the field - and simply having had the personal experience of addiction doesn't automatically make you a good worker
 
the actuall qualification to be a counsellor is very misleading,
but i took the Cert IV Alcohol and other drug course at CIT in Canberra, ended up doing the full diploma and then the advanced diploma,

i found tafe great practical experience mixed with basic theory, but for me by the end i wanted more and started social work this year which is further depth in knowledge and theory, which balences out tafe v. nicely :)

the Cert 4 cxan be done with eyes closed (well i found anyway) the higher you go with education the better you are if you are still passionate about the area.

i found motivational interviewing to be one of the best skill based counselling techniqus that you can use with youth and got more out of the MI training by joel porter than many of the tafe courses.

Link to website



if you want more info private message me :) or wait till i can post a good amount of info in here :)
 
PS there are not many male social workers around ............ you get to sit in classes full of women ;)
 
pretty sure that holmesglen do a D&A course. But also their youth work diploma would probably be your best bet to start off.
Its a pretty good tafe, i did my first year of Youth Work there
and tbh its straight to the point none of the dicking around that you get at uni. i went from finishing my first year and holmesglen then getting into uni and decided the uni course was just a complete roundabout waste of time because i couldnt understand really why learning the history of socialism or whatever affected the work i would be doing once i got into the field.
 
i did my cert 4 in AOD at Holmesglen last yr
you can do it at morrabin or waverly
you can combine this with quals in mental health, youth work etc, at the same time becasuse its easy - theres no home work asides from assignments and they're small - and class only takes up half a wk

theyre right you need a min cert 4 to work in AOD pretty much any where - its industry standard

just beware that even tho your have a cert in AOD or youthwork some consellor jobs will only hire those with a qual in psych or social work (which i now study).

try and suss out what you think youll need long term, ganted once you have a qual in any social welfare field it seems pretty easy to move around.;)
 
Thank you all so much for your responses, sorry, I've been away and then rather sick. It's given me some food for thought, I'm sure I'll probably PM some of you in the next day or so.

become an addict and get to feel what its 'really' like - no amount of study will give you that education!
Click to expand...
The experinces with my best friend last year come as close to being an addict without being one myself.... it opened my eyes up and I learnt a LOT!

Good on you, particularly if you are male
Click to expand...
Sure am! As a male I was in high demand when I worked on School Holiday Programs and Out Of Hours Care a few years ago.
 
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Have been going through a lot of resources and sussing out stuff (many thanks to Tronica for her help). Now that I'm a little more versed.... I'm lookin at doing at Cert IV in A&OD and I have very limited understanding on the whole TAFE system. Looking to study part time as I can't afford to be full time student. My questions is, whats the difference between Cert. IV, Grad. Cert., Diploma and Grad Dimploma? I'm assuming "entry level" is a Cert IV, and I can work my way up to Diploma from there?? I've made a short list of places to go check out when open days roll around in August, so by the end iof August I should have a much better understanding.
 
Check out the Diploma of Community Welfare.

It's a good diploma to have under your belt.
 
Anything with "Graduate" in front of it is generally for people who've done an undergraduate degree already (eg a uni degree). These are what people refer to as post-graduate degrees. For the TAFE diplomas, the various levels refer to how long / detailed to course is. Certificate IV is one of the shortest, diplomas are often one year and advanced diplomas are often two years. This varies though between institutions. And you're right about starting off at a lower level and working your way up. That's how most people do it, and each level builds on the previous.

If you find a course you're interested in, I'd recommend phoning them or going in to meet with someone in person. They're a business these days, and they want your cash, so they are normally very helpful in pointing you in the right direction and explaining things.
 
i have done the AOD studies in the tafe system, tyhe cert 4 is 1 year full time the diploma is another year ontop of the cert 4 and the advanced diploma as it is otherwise known is an extra 6 units on top which i did at the same time as the diploma content.' as for the grad diploma i couldnt find anything on it at the national training website

to get a good look at what is involoved in the study if you look at the training packages at turniong point website or national traning package

i was lucky that doing the advanced diploma of communtiy services counted towards two years of the social work degree that im currently doing
 
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The Community Health training package is being reviewed at the moment (CHC02) - which may change things slightly by next year. But hopefully not by too much!! AT the moment, Victoria Uni offers a 2 year Diploma of Youth Work, with the option of doing some AOD competencies along the way - after 2 years you end up with a Diploma of Youth Works AND a Cert IV AOD work. You can do an extra year and end up with a BA in youth work (then you can do a grad dip!)

It kind of depends whether your focus is youth or drugs as to whether studying youth work or AOD work - but they both overlap anyway.
 
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