Suicide Prevention for Educators

Postvention

Course Description

An effective postvention response is a critical component of school-based suicide prevention efforts. If a student dies by suicide, educators need to understand their role and response to other students in the school district.

What You’ll Learn

Participants will be able to describe the components and rationale for a postvention response to a student death by suicide.

Participants will be able to identify ways that students may express grief in the classroom, and discuss how they can respond to student grief.

Participants will be able to describe the importance of self-care in dealing with a student suicide.

Learning Assests

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2012). Preventing suicide: A Toolkit for High Schools. (Note: Chapter 3 covers ‘After a Suicide’).

Available Here

American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and Suicide Prevention Resource Center (2011). After a Suicide: A Toolkit for Schools.

Available Here

McCommons, P.S. & Rosen, P. (2020). Postvention Standards Manual: A Guide for a School’s Response in the Aftermath of a Sudden Death, 5th Edition.

Available Here

Facilitators

Matthew Wintersteen, Ph.D

Associate Professor, Department of Psychiatry & Human Behavior Director of Research, Division of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Sidney Kimmel Medical College, Thomas Jefferson University; Executive Board, Prevent Suicide PA, Philadelphia, PA

Terri A. Erbacher, Ph.D

Clinical Associate Professor, Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine; Author of Suicide in Schools: A Practitioner’s Guide to Multi-Level Prevention, Assessment, Intervention, and Postvention

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Funding
This website was made possible by Grant Number H79SM082149 from the SAMHSA. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the SAMHSA.

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