Across nearly four lakh students surveyed by NCERT under the Manodarpan initiative, one pattern stood out again and again: well-being is tightly linked to academic pressure, peer relationships, confidence, concentration, and coping skills. Academics topped the list of reasons students cited for anxiety, followed closely by exams and results.
A recent article, “How infrastructure can support the mental health of our students,” makes an important point that builds on this reality: India doesn’t always need to build new mental health institutions from scratch — it can strengthen and connect the systems that already exist around children. We agree. But for that infrastructure to actually work, the first layer has to be universal.
Student mental health support cannot begin only when a child is already in visible distress. Every student and every teacher needs access to a baseline layer of well-being education: basic emotional literacy, stress management, help-seeking, peer relationship skills, self-awareness, and responsible decision-making. At Sai Shiko, we think of this as psychological immunization — instead of “therapy” for all, foundational protection for all.
This layer also has to be digital. Students are already digital-first. They are often more comfortable starting with a screen, a chat, a nudge, or a self-paced module than with a formal counselling room. Digital tools make scale possible too: schools can fold well-being check-ins, courses, dashboards, alerts, and referral pathways directly into systems they already use, like ERPs or LMS platforms.
None of this replaces counsellors — it is meant to support them. India needs to rapidly expand the supply of trained school counsellors; the gap is real and well documented. But simply filling posts is not enough, because counselling in schools is deeply contextual work. A counsellor learns from the lived realities of children, families, classrooms, academic pressure, peer dynamics, and school culture. A well-supported school counselling system becomes, in effect, a site of new knowledge about adolescent well-being in India — one that a strong universal first layer can feed, by catching needs early, normalizing conversations, and freeing up higher levels of care for the students who genuinely need them.
While our focus in this piece is on counsellors, we have learnt – in over 5 years of working with 50+ schools – that the principal remains the key player in any school’s well-being ecosystem. A good school often runs on the empathy, judgement, and effectiveness of its principal; but today, the principal is also, in many ways, the school’s chief well-being officer. This is an enormous responsibility. Alongside academic leadership, administration, parent concerns, discipline, safety, and institutional pressures, the principal is expected to respond to the emotional lives of children.
No principal should have to carry this alone. They need trained counsellors and adolescent well-being experts as part of their core community — people who know the children and the parents, recognise patterns early, and offer immediate, practical, informed guidance. Supporting the principal with an effective counsellor does more than supporting that one individual – it is support for the entire school community.
Counsellors, therefore, cannot be treated as a “good to have” in schools. They are a prerequisite for a responsive, humane, future-ready school system. If we want children to learn well, we have to first build systems that help them feel seen, supported, and safe. That’s how mental health infrastructure goes from being purely reactive to becoming preventive, scalable, and embedded in everyday school life.
If your school is thinking through what this first layer could look like, reach out to us.
A recent article, “How infrastructure can support the mental health of our students,” makes an important argument: India does not always need to build new mental health institutions from scratch; it can strengthen and connect the systems that already exist around children. We agree. But for this infrastructure to truly work, the first layer must be universal.
Student mental health support cannot begin only when a child is already in visible distress. Every student and every teacher needs access to a baseline layer of well-being education: basic emotional literacy, stress management, help-seeking, peer relationship skills, self-awareness, and responsible decision-making.
At Sai Shiko, we think of this as psychological immunization — instead of “therapy” for all, we focus on foundational protection for all. The need is clear. The NCERT-Manodarpan survey covered nearly four lakh students across India and found that students’ well-being is deeply linked with academic pressure, peer relationships, confidence, concentration, and coping skills. Academics were the most frequently cited reason for anxiety, followed by examinations and results. The report also notes that students’ socio-emotional concerns should inform school curriculum, teacher education, and proactive interventions.
The second requirement is that this layer must be digital. Students are already digital-first. They are often more comfortable beginning with a screen, a chat, a nudge, or a self-paced module than with a formal counselling room. Digital tools also make scale possible: schools can integrate well-being check-ins, courses, dashboards, alerts, and referral pathways into systems they already use, such as ERPs or LMS platforms.
We want to be clear that digital infrastructure is not a replacement for human care. The real opportunity here is to support counsellors in doing their work more effectively. For this, India must rapidly expand the supply of trained school counsellors. The gap is real. But simply “filling posts” is not enough. Counselling in schools is deeply contextual work. A counsellor learns from the lived realities of children, families, classrooms, academic pressure, peer dynamics, and school culture. In that sense, every well-supported school counselling system also becomes a site of new knowledge creation about adolescent well-being in India. A strong digital-first, universal first layer can identify needs early, normalize conversations, ensure that higher levels of care are reserved for students who genuinely need them, and most importantly, document these lived realities and the system’s learning from them in order to support students most effectively.
While our focus in this piece is on counsellors, we have learnt – in over 5 years of working with 50+ schools – that the principal remains the key player in any school’s well-being ecosystem. A good school often runs on the empathy, judgement, and effectiveness of its principal; but today, the principal is also, in many ways, the school’s chief well-being officer. This is an enormous responsibility. Alongside academic leadership, administration, parent concerns, teacher needs, discipline, safety, and institutional pressures, the principal is expected to respond to the emotional lives of children. No principal should have to carry this alone. They need trained counsellors and adolescent well-being experts as part of their core community of educators: people who understand the children, know the parents, recognise patterns early, and can offer immediate, practical, and informed guidance. Supporting the principal with an effective counsellor is, therefore, not merely supporting one individual; it is supporting the entire school community.
Counsellors cannot be treated as a “good to have” resource in schools.
They are a prerequisite for a responsive, humane, and future-ready school system.
If we want children to learn well, we must first build systems that help them feel seen, supported, and safe.
That is how mental health infrastructure becomes not just reactive, but preventive, scalable, and embedded in everyday school life.
With Grit & Gratitude
The Sai Shiko Team