The government has been challenged to employ psychologists and social workers at schools to help them deal with violence and socioeconomic issues affecting pupils. Sonke Gender Justice activist Mbuyiselo Botha said every school required at least one psychologist or social worker.Children in poorer schools, typically in townships and rural areas, were marginalised by a lack of immediate access to psychosocial services, he told The Times."Communities are ravaged by incidents of extreme violence daily and children are exposed to them, but there aren't sufficient services available for them."If we are prepared to invest in tablets and paperless classrooms, we should be prepared to invest in the psychosocial wellbeing of our children," said Botha.Only two of seven provinces responded yesterday to questions The Times put to them.The Gauteng education department has 54 educational psychologists on its payroll, all of whom are based at district offices. There are more than 2000 public schools in Gauteng.Spokesman Phumla Sekhonyane said the department did not plan to appoint educational psychologists at schools in the near future. Its psychologists were required to "render a service to a broader school community".Gauteng spent just over R9-million on psychosocial services for pupils in the 2014-2015 financial year.The Western Cape, which has 136 educational psychologists, spent about R105-million on psychosocial services in the same period.Provincial education spokesman Jessica Shelver said it was "in the process of filling the vacant posts" for psychologists and counsellors, particularly district-based ones.There are more than 60 psychologists at Western Cape district offices and 30 at special schools. There are 20 registered counsellors at vocational schools.University of Pretoria education psychologist Kobus Maree said there were enough educational psychologists in practice and qualifying to meet the needs of schools, but they were not being employed in this capacity."Year after year we have qualified educational psychologists streaming out of training institutions but it is only private or more affluent schools that appoint them [even though] incidents of extreme violence rarely occur in their areas."He said a large proportion of the teaching fraternity did not have the necessary "know-how" or training in handling some of the psychosocial challenges children faced."We have a budget that should allow for psychosocial services. If [it does] not, we should make funding available because such an issue is incontestable. We need these services in our schools," Maree said...