Administrator and Crisis Response Team FAQ

The CRT Team recommends the following link:

Death: Dealing with Crisis at School Practical Suggestions for Educators

The CRT Team recommends the following links:

Suggestions for Dealing with the Media

Responsible Media Coverage

Addressing Grief: Tips for Administrators and Teachers​

• Assign staff member to follow deceased student schedule to monitor peer reactions and answer questions (remember to remove students name from School Information System - BUT if in HS, keep track of courses completed)
• Newberry (NEA HIN) agrees that the school should collectively decide on a date to return to routine. But until then, allow students the time for grieving. Kids who are struggling and don’t come to classes shouldn’t be counted as truant; if they don’t turn in their assignments, they should be given an extension. “But after you provide an environment to grieve and mourn for a period of time, it’s important to return to normalcy as soon as possible,” says Newberry. “Returning to a regular routine is essential to healing.” ~Lessons on Loss Article (add resiliency and mindset information here).
• All too often, adults are negatively influenced by the cause of death, particularly if the death was suicide or alcohol/drug-related. It is extremely unhealthy for teens to be denied adequate outlets for their grief based on how or why the person died. The bottom line is: someone special to them has died – regardless of the circumstances of the death. Schools who disallow memorialization because it is a suicide for example, are creating an environment of frustration and hostility for the surviving friends. These survivors are left to feel as if they are being punished for their friend’s decision. Furthermore, it is, in effect, denying the life of that child who died! One of the most important things we can teach our children is how to honor life.

In the face of apparent contagion, it is important for schools to utilize counselors and others who have been trained to identify students who may be at heightened risk for suicide due to underlying mental disorders or behavioral problems (such as depression, anxiety, conduct disorder, and/or substance abuse) and who have been exposed to the prior suicide either directly (by virtue of close identification or relationship with the deceased) or indirectly (by virtue of extensive media coverage).

Of special concern are those students who:

• have a history of suicide attempts
• are dealing with stressful life events such as a death or divorce in the family
• were eyewitnesses to the death
• are family members or close friends of the deceased (including siblings at other schools as well as teammates, classmates, and acquaintances of the deceased)
• received a phone call, text, or other communication from the deceased foretelling the suicide
• may have fought with or bullied the deceased

In the future, schools can also seek to identify those in the general student body who may be at heightened risk by using a mental health screening tool (a process sometimes called case finding) such as Signs of Suicide or others listed in the Suicide Prevention Resource Center/American Foundation for Suicide Prevention Best Practices Registry.

• Keep to regular school hours
• Encourage family to consider holding the funeral off school property and also later in the day (after school hours) if possible.
• If the funeral is held during school hours, school should remain open. Students should be permitted to attend with parental permission, but the school should not transport students or take students to wake/funeral. Encourage parents to attend with their child.
• Schools should respond consistently to all deaths.
• Provide food and drinks for the students, the staff and volunteers that came in to assist the building.

• Spontaneous memorials (lockers, desk, etc)-allow for an agreed upon time (5 days would be recommended) with the parents, and monitor for messages that may indicate a student needs additional assistance/intervention.
• Try to avoid memorials/scholarships/benches/t-shirts/bracelets/decals/balloons/ plaques/etc. For example, if a memorial is created for one student, then it will be the expectation the next time there is a student death.
• “It is recommended that schools discourage requests to create and distribute t-shirts and buttons bearing images of the deceased by explaining that, while these items may be comforting to some students, they may be quite upsetting to others. If students come to school wearing such items without first seeking permission, it is recommended that they be allowed to wear the items for that day only, and that it should be explained to them that repeatedly bringing images of the deceased student into the school can be disruptive and can glamorize suicide” (p36 - suicide toolkit) suicide contagion (a group of suicide or suicide attempts that appear close together - behavior that leads to cluster of suicides).
• Consider providing posterboard and markers for students who wish to create a memorial to be delivered to the family by a staff member.  
• Permanent Memorials: it is recommended that they be established off school grounds. Moreover, the school should bear in mind that once it plants a tree, puts up a plaque, installs a park bench, or establishes a named scholarship for one deceased student, it should be prepared to do so for others, which can become quite difficult to sustain over time.
• Online Memorial Pages: “Online memorial pages and message boards have become common practice in the aftermath of a death. Some schools (with the permission and support of the deceased student’s family) may choose to establish a memorial page on the school website or on a social networking site. As with all memorialization following a suicide death, such pages should take care not to glamorize the death in ways that may lead other at-risk students to identify with the person who died. It is therefore vital that memorial pages utilize safe messaging, include resources, be monitored by an adult, and be time-limited. It is recommended that online memorial pages remain active for up to 30 to 60 days after the death, at which time they should be taken down and replaced with a statement acknowledging the caring and supportive messages that had been posted and encouraging students who wish to further honor their friend to consider other creative suggestions. If the student’s friends create a memorial page of their own, it is important that school personnel communicate with the students to ensure that the page includes safe messaging and accurate information. School personnel should also join any student-initiated memorial pages so that they can monitor and respond as appropriate.”

​​Additional Resources:

• https://www1.maine.gov/suicide/docs/SchoolMemorials.pdf
• http://rems.ed.gov/docs/ercmnewsletter_memorials.pdf

• The guiding principle is that all deaths should be treated the same way. So if there is a history of dedicating the yearbook (or a page of the yearbook) to students who have died, that policy is equally applicable to a student who has died by suicide, provided that final editorial decisions are made by an adult.
• Whenever possible, the focus should be on mental health and/or suicide prevention. For example, underneath the student’s picture it might say, “In your memory we will work to erase the stigma surrounding mental illness and suicide.”

The guiding principle is that all deaths should be treated the same way. If there is a tradition of including a tribute to deceased students who would have graduated with the class, students who have died by suicide should likewise be included. For example, schools may wish to include a brief statement acknowledging and naming those students from the graduating class who have died. Final decisions about what to include in such tributes should be made by school personnel.