When Death and loss impact the school community

*Addressing Death and Grief

*Major Events

*Axe Murder at the Edge of Campus*High profile death of parent

*How we responded

*Lock down per police request*Counselor team heads to the gym*Write down each kids name and what they

saw*Counselors meet with Senior Admin*Counselor calls the parents of all the kids in the gym class.*Email from the head of School

*How we responded

*Follow up throughout the year*Addressing the fantasy and the reality*Poems, essays, etc.

*Continued tons of communication from Admin to parents*Extended Time off for the Teacher who witness and managed the initial response

*Development

*What we did well*Focus on communication*Lots of communication and interaction with kids ongoing

*What we could have done better*Better Training for Staff

*On-going tasks for teachers

*ART: create collages *HISTORY: put event in historical context*ENGLISH: journaling or poetry*SCIENCE: understanding brain chemistry

causing psychotic bipolar*MATH: maps area of incident*MUSIC: relaxation music to manage stress*GYM: yoga

*Our Response

*No written Crisis response*Senior Admin have lots of experience so

there is a protocol*Tom calls mary 10 minutes after the death*We ask permission for all communication*Tons of communication*Head of school writes and edit and

reviews by 3-4 people

*Supporting Students

*Anniversary was also a challenge*Many middle school kids traumatized ie. What if my

mother was killed or died as many have no experience with death

*Could that happen to me*Lots of loose talk about death*Between May 2012 abd April 2013 we had 7

parents die including Kathy Goertzen*SAAS has 3 permanent counselors*Our media spokesperson, former Seattle Sonics

Media man

*Our Improvement

*Need more training in how to communicate with students in crisis events, particularly for MS students*Many of our young exuberant staff have

great relationships with younger kids but don’t have skills for crisis mode.*Need to learn to Hear, care and listen then

become part of the counselor team*Should have a written crisis plan