Alamance-Burlington School System

1. Alamance-Burlington School System Crisis Team Training Revised May 2012 1

2. Objectives of the Training • To quickly and accurately assess the severity and impact of a crisis situation • To ensure that a chain of command and duties/roles be followed exactly • To review school procedures and forms to be used in responding to a crisis • To introduce the PREPaRE Model for recovery interventions and support (Psychological First Aid) 2

3. Organization of the Training • Review Section I of Crisis Manual: Planning, Organization and Response • Review of CRP (Crisis Response Protocol) Forms and Procedure sheets • Table top scenarios: Practice with a crisis • Presentation of the PREPaRE Model for crisis intervention: Psychological First Aid 3

4. The Crisis Plan Goals of the Plan: • 1. To prepare and organize the Crisis Team members to respond effectively in a crisis situation. • 2. To help manage the crisis recovery activities and services in an organized, efficient and effective manner • 3. Limit the negative emotional and social impact of the crisis situation • To help return to normal functioning as quickly as possible 4

5. Day 1-Organization, Planning, and Logistics • Organizational Chart Of Recovery Systems CRP-1 5

6. Crisis Events • What events would require the Crisis Team to come together at your school? • What are some of the first things your crisis team will need to do? • What should have happened in planning before the first crisis meeting? • How do you determine what outside or in school resources you may need? 6

7. Levels of School Crisis Impact/Response The following is very important to determine accurately and quickly. What reactions and consequences will the crisis have on the persons in the school? • Minimal Impact/Minimal response • Building-level Impact/Building Level Response • District-Level Impact/District response • Community or regional Level Impact/ Community Level Response *Activity 1-Handout-Identify Impact & Response 7

8. The Consequences of a Less than Adequate Response to a Crisis by a School • Perceptions of parents, staff and students 8

9. Activity • The Positive Consequences of Crisis Events 1. In small groups identify some of the positive outcomes (or opportunities) that may result from exposure to a crisis event. 2. Identify potential positive outcomes for both individual students, staff, parents and school or school systems 9

10. Review CRP forms 2, 3, and 4 • CRP-2 Organizational Chart • CRP-3 System Level Crisis Team • CPR-4 Community Support Services 10

11. Disaster/Crisis Response Kit CRP-5 • Contents should include: • Copy of Crisis Team Manual • Copies of all forms used by teachers, administrators, ans support services providers in referring students and in the provision of in school assistance and follow up by support service providers • Copy of the Family Reunification plan and procedure • If possible pictures of all students and staff members 11

12. CRP-6 School & System Procedures • Discuss at your school’s initial planning meeting this year • Discuss recommendations • Formalize into a plan for your building • Medication mobility in a crisis • Field Trip or Athletic event crisis • Student dismissal in a crisis

13. CRP-7 System & School Level Roles & Responsibilities • Assign roles for your school’s team along with alternates • Consider developing a phone tree or sharing of phone numbers (Connect Ed may not work in a power outage) • Assemble some items ahead of time: copies of forms, blank name tags, etc.

14. CRP-8 Dealing with the Media • See form for memo from the ABSS Public Information Office • “Our Public Information Office handles all media calls. Please call 438-4005 or 438-4006 and they will be happy to assist you. Or call 570-6060, and the front desk receptionist will direct your call to the right person.”

15. First Day Procedures CRP-9 • Review and discuss all items on this form. • Your school’s Crisis Team should be familiar with these procedures 15

16. CRP-10 Checklist for First Day & First Meeting of Crisis Team • Utilize this form at your school’s first Crisis Team meeting following the news of a crisis • Checklist is to be used as a tool to ensure all needed steps and areas are complete 16

17. CRP-11 Checklist for Initial Staff Meeting Agenda • Utilize this checklist during your Crisis Team’s first meeting with the entire school staff • Do not forget to include itinerate staff, and cafeteria & bus staff members. Crisis information is vital to all 17

18. CPR 12 Forms A, B, and C • Sample letter to Parents (English & Spanish • Sample letter to staff • Sample letter to student body • Remember the importance of parent permission to release names • Review and adapt these samples to your school prior to a crisis • Plan how to address extremely affected areas of your building (substitutes needed, support staff to stand –in to read announcement to class, staff with prior conditions) , families with literacy issues, and those students’ families with no phones

19. Review CRP Forms 14 & 15 • Document ALL students who are seen by a Recovery Responder • Allows for follow-up & monitoring • Allows for parent contact when needed • Be sensitive-do not make students stand in line to “sign-in” • Completed CRP-14 forms must be given to School’s Crisis Team Chair and recorded on CRP-15 19

20. CRP-16 After-Hours or Off-Campus Crisis Response • Your school’s Crisis Team should consult with an administrator • These procedures should be shared with staff involved with field trips, and extra-curricular activities • Each school building should formalize procedures

21. CRP-17, 18, & 19 • *CRP-17: In the event of a real crisis this form is useful for evaluating your school and team after the event is over. • CRP-18: Reunification Site Concepts Logistic Schematic • *CRP-18: This form is to be used when your team practices table-top exercises of a crisis. • *Both forms should be submitted to the System Level Crisis Team Chair

22. Importance of Debriefing and Practice with table top scenarios • Caring for the Caregivers/Responders • Caring for the staff • Strongly recommended that two table top scenarios be held with entire crisis team present each school year. Scenarios are included in the crisis manual appendices. • School Crisis Teams should meet quarterly. 22

23. BEGIN CRISIS SCENARIOS • HANDOUT TO COMPLETE AND OR TAKE NOTES ON AS YOU DO A SCENARIO 23

24. Dealing with effects on students, staff and parents • Psychological effects on students • Interventions/Psychological first aid 24

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26. Key Questions and Topics • What “crisis events” may require a crisis intervention? • What “crisis reactions” are the focus of crisis intervention? • What is school “crisis intervention?” Psychological first aid to what groups and individuals? • How does school crisis intervention fit into the larger school crisis response? 26

27. The crisis state is… “… a temporary state of upset and disorganization, characterized chiefly by an individual’s inability to cope with a particular situation using customary methods of problem solving, and by the potential for a radically positive or negative outcome” (Slaikeu, • More than simple stress • Not necessarily mental illness *Defenses are down, suggestibility is high, not coping-suppression and denial operating. 27

28. Crisis Event Characteristics • According to the DSM IV-TR, events that may generate traumatic stress and require crisis intervention include a) Experiencing b) Witnessing, and/or c) Learning about an event that involves actual death or physical injury, and/or threatened death or physical injury” (APA, 2000, p. 463) 28

29. Crisis Event Characteristics • Extremely negative • Uncontrollable • Unpredictable 29

30. Crisis Classifications • Severe illness and/or injury • Violent and/or unexpected death • Threatened death and/or injury • Acts of war and/or terrorism • Natural disasters • Man-made/industrial disasters 30

31. Crisis Event Characteristics • Variables that affect an events traumatic potential Type of disaster – Natural vs. human cause Source of physical threat and/or injury – Human aggression vs. accidental (not human caused) Presence of fatalities, injuries – The greater the number the greater the traumatic potential 31

32. Crisis Event Reactions/Consequences According to DSM IV-TR, crisis event consequences signaling that an event has generated traumatic stress include responses that “involve intense fear, helplessness, or horror (or in children, the response must involve disorganized or agitated behavior)” (APA, 2000, p. 463). 32

33. Typical or expected reactions to a crisis by children • Normal reactions to an abnormal event. • Fear, anxiety, sadness, anger, confusion, agitation • Other? • Handout 4 from PREPARE workbook. 33

34. Levels of School Crisis Impact/Response The following is very important to determine accurately and quickly. What reactions and consequences will the crisis have on the school? • Minimal Impact/Minimal response • Building-level Impact/Building Level Response • District-Level Impact/District response • Community or regional Level Impact/ Community Level Response 34

35. Possible Consequences • Psychopathological Consequences • Anxiety Disorders • Substance – Related Disorders • Dissociative Disorders • Mood Disorders • Disorders of Infancy, Childhood, or Adolescence • Sleep Disorders • Adjustment Disorders • School Functioning Consequences • School behavior problems (i.e., aggressive, delinquent, and criminal behavior) and school absenteeism • Academic decline • Exacerbation of pre-existing educational problems and/or behavioral problems 35

36. RECOVERY RESPONSE-INDIVIDUAL INTERVENTIONS 36

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43. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Definition of, and Rationale for, Psychological Triage -Psychological Trauma Risk Factors and Warning Signs 1. Crisis Exposure 2. Personal Vulnerabilities 3. Threat Perceptions 4. Crisis Reactions - 43

44. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Psychological Triage Defined “The process of evaluating and sorting victims by immediacy of treatment needed and directing them to immediate or delayed treatment. The goal of triage is to do the greatest good for the greatest number of victims” (NIMH, 2002, p. 27). 44

45. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Rationale for Psychological Triage 1) Not all individuals will be equally affected by a crisis. One size does not fit all. Some will need intensive intervention. Others will need very little, if any intervention. 45

46. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Rationale for Psychological Triage 2) Recovery from crisis exposure is the norm. Crisis intervention should be offered in response to demonstrated need. “Not everyone exposed to trauma either needs or wants professional help” (McNally et al., 2003, p. 73). EXCEPTION: Students with pre-existing psychopathology. 46

47. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Rationale for Psychological Triage 3) There is a need to identify those who will recover relatively independently. Crisis intervention may cause harm if not truly needed. a. It may increase crisis exposure. b. It may reduce perceptions of independent problem solving. c. It may generate self-fulfilling prophecies. 47

48. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Variable 1: Crisis Exposure* a) Physical proximity b) Emotional proximity *Risk factors that increase the probability of psychological trauma and, as such, should result in increased vigilance for psychological trauma warning signs. 48

49. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Variable 1a: Physical Proximity Where were students when the crisis occurred (i.e., how close were they to the traumatic event)? a. The closer they were (i.e., the more direct their exposure) the greater the risk of psychological trauma. b. The more physically distant they were, the lower the risk of psychological trauma. 49

50. Evaluate Psychological Trauma Variable 1b: Emotional Proximity • Individuals who have/had close relationships with crisis victims should be made crisis intervention treatment priorities. • May include having a friend who knew someone killed or injured 50