Abstract:
There are some societal concerns, such as drug misuse, strippers, and street children that
require counseling services outside of the educational context. Counseling programmes in
social communities have yet to be implemented. The major objective of this research was to
help counselors to solve problems when providing counseling services in the community.
Information was collected through questionnaires, focus groups and interviews. Surveys were
used to gather quantitative data, which was then analysed with descriptive statistics and
percentage analysis. Interactive analysis which has four stages: data collection, reduction,
display, and conclusions, was used to look at qualitative data. The community-based approach
for counseling programme creation was ready to be implemented to improve the quality of
counseling services in the community. In collaboration with the Ministry of Health and the
Base Hospital-Welimada, an NGO has been providing HIV counseling. Counseling, spiritual
activities, and other activities were provided to help people feel better. By analyzing students'
developments about their spirituality, the evaluation could be done on their daily actions.
Based on the findings, community counselors required a model of a guidance and counseling
programme in the community as a guidance and counseling service. The research was divided
into four stages: basic research, conceptualization and creation of a community-based
guidance and counseling model, validation by experts and practitioners through focus groups,
and programme improvement and development. The recommendations were made by the
researcher to detail the operational research stages so that the model was more applicable and
understandable; and for community counselors to develop guidance and counseling
programmes based on community needs that are appropriate to provide the best guidance and
counseling services.
