Module 3 Summary

Recap

  • Remember that grief is a natural and healthy response to loss and that students (and staff) experience and express grief differently.
  • Take a proactive approach when possible, by incorporating education about grief, loss, and support strategies into your lessons, and by encouraging your school to develop or update a response plan for serious illnesses and deaths.  
  • When someone in the school community is dying or has died, provide students, staff, and families with accurate information in a timely manner. 
  • Identify any vulnerable or at-risk students and ensure they receive additional support.
  • After a death from suicide, communicate sensitively and as openly as possible with your students. Pay close attention to current school-specific postvention recommendations, and keep in mind the need to balance the need of students for information with the wishes of the family.  Avoid sensationalizing or glamourizing the death in any way.