Educational Administrators
As you plan for adolescent safety—we are here to help you plan.
Consultation for school-based suicide response, suicide prevention training, and support in the development of school crisis plans, for educational administrators.
Start where you are.
Crisis happens. Tragedies have ripple effects. Individual crises often impact groups, if not entire school communities. Information spreads quickly—as does misinformation. Returning to daily functioning is rarely linear.
Be ready. Having a crisis plan that you hope you will never need is imperative (much like backing up your computer hard drive—lesson learned!). If the unthinkable happens, the details will matter. Ensure you have them.
Specialized experience matters. Experience and training in school crisis response serves as our foundation for knowing how to proceed in unexpected situations (including: students who make suicide threats and attempts, threat assessments, individuals or groups who engage in self-injury, students and staff enduring deaths and other unforeseen tragedies and their aftermath). Consultation with INLIGHT Psychological Services can help direct you to resources for immediate use and/or help you create plans specific to your crisis situation.
Get in touch
The Comprehensive Approach to Mental Health Promotion and Suicide Prevention for High Schools
The work of the JED Foundation Set-to-Go High School Initiative in improving the mental health of high school students is widely respected, comprehensive and research-based, yet immediately useable.
I was privileged to contribute to The Comprehensive Approach to Mental Health Promotion and Suicide Prevention for High Schools, particularly with regard to crisis response procedures, as an Implementation Advisory Board member and consultant to this project.
Plan for safety. Be ready for crisis.
Adolescent Mental Health Resources for Educational Administrators
These toolkits and guides can assist with school-wide crisis planning.
Toolkits
The Comprehensive Approach to Mental Health Promotion and Suicide Prevention for High Schools
JED
Our work shifts the culture and conversation around mental health by focusing on two components to change and save lives: strengthening the emotional health of teens and young adults so they can thrive today…and tomorrow, and preventing substance misuse, self-harm, and suicide as a result of emotional distress. We do this by equipping individuals, strengthening schools, and mobilizing communities.
Seize the Awkward
Campus Toolkit
Mental health can affect your campus community in different ways. Bring Seize the Awkward to your campus with our Toolkit to help encourage conversations between your peers. In this toolkit, we’ll share tips on how to help young adults who may be struggling with their mental health, and best practices to have supportive conversations about everyday challenges with them.
American Foundation of Suicide Prevention
Model School District Policy on Suicide Prevention
This document outlines model policies and best practices for school districts to follow to protect the health and safety of all students. Protecting the health and well-being of students is in line with school mandates and is an ethical imperative for all professionals working with youth.
SAMHSA
Preventing Suicide: A Toolkit for High Schools
This was funded by the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to help high schools, school districts, and their partners design and implement strategies to prevent suicide and promote behavioral health among their students.
Heard Alliance
Toolkit for Mental Health Promotion and Suicide Prevention
This Toolkit has drawn on evidence based national and state youth suicide prevention guidelines. In California, a suicide prevention policy is now required of all Public School Districts and Charter Schools serving students in 7th – 12th grades. This Toolkit is meant to serve as the implementation tool for this policy.
Suicide Prevention Resource Center
After a Suicide Toolkit for Schools: Second Edition
After a Suicide focuses on how to respond in the immediate aftermath of a suicide death of a student. Ideally, schools should have a crisis response and postvention plan in place before a suicide occurs. That will enable staff to respond in an organized and effective manner. But whether or not a school has such a plan, this toolkit contains information schools can use to initiate a coordinated response.
Cornell Research Program on Self-injury and Recovery
Non-suicidal Self-injury in the Schools: Developing and Implementing School Protocol
Non-suicidal self-injury is an increasingly common behavior among school-aged youth and occurs with regularity in secondary school and college settings. It is uncommon however, for schools to have well-articulated protocols for detecting, intervening in, and preventing self- injury. Although specific protocols and practices are likely to vary considerably from school to school, this report provides an overview of best practices for detecting and responding to self- injury in secondary school settings.
Violence/Threat Assessment Resources
Dr. Dewey Cornell
Comprehensive School Threat Assessment Guidelines: Intervention and Support to Prevent Violence
The manual covers the mental health assessment of a student who poses a very serious substantive threat, the main pathways to violence that must be considered, and intervention strategies to help troubled students and prevent their conflicts and problems from escalating into violence. The manual includes helpful forms carrying out and documenting a threat assessment and initiating behavior support plans. All forms are freely available for copying and are used to conduct a threat assessment, as explained in the manual.
See also:
VIEW
National Education Association
School Crisis Guide
Schools experience a wide variety of crises that have the potential to harm the mental and physical health, learning environment, and safety of students and educators. Once a crisis occurs, schools must be prepared to address mental health implications to reduce further distress or secondary crises. This updated school crisis response guide provides recommendations and guidance for all the phases of crisis response, with added emphasis on the psychological health and safety of students and school staff.
U.S. Secret Service
Protecting America’s Schools: U.S. Secret Service Analysis of Targeted School Violence
While communities can advance many school safety measures on their own, our experience tells us that keeping schools safe requires a team effort and the combined resources of the federal, state, and local governments; school boards; law enforcement; and the public. With this study, the Secret Service provides an unprecedented base of facts about school violence, as well as an updated methodology and practical guidelines for prevention.
Training Resources
American Foundation of Suicide Prevention
Signs Matter: Early Detection Training
Signs Matter: Early Detection fulfills many states’ requirements for educators to have two hours of instruction on suicide prevention and bullying. The program presents scientifically based information on a variety of topics related to youth suicide, alongside best practice recommendations drawn from experts in the mental health and education fields. Science sheds light on key questions of risk and protective factors for youth suicide, as well as the most common behavioral presentations expressed by at risk youth. Recommendations for school personnel roles, support, referrals, and interventions are drawn from best practices of educational and mental health experts.
The Trevor Project
Connect, Accept, Respond, Empower (CARE) Training for adults
The Trevor Project’s CARE (Connect, Accept, Respond, Empower) Training is an interactive and intensive training that provides adults with an overview of suicide among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth and the different environmental stressors that contribute to their heightened risk for suicide.
See also
VIEW
LivingWorks
LivingWorks Start
LivingWorks Start teaches valuable skills to everyone 13 and older and requires no formal training or prior experience in suicide prevention. When you sign up for LivingWorks Start training, you'll learn a powerful four-step model to keep someone safe from suicide, and you'll have a chance to practice it with impactful simulations. This training is free for students and staff in California schools.
Question, Persuade, Refer Institute
QPR Training
To save lives and reduce suicidal behaviors by providing innovative, practical and proven suicide prevention training. We believe that quality education empowers all people, regardless of their background, to make a positive difference in the life of someone they know.
Social Media Guidelines for Suicide Prevention Resources
Reportingonsuicide.org
Best Practices and Recommendations for Reporting on Suicide
Media pays an important role in preventing suicide. Over 100 studies worldwide have found that risk of contagion is real and responsible reporting can reduce the risk of additional suicides. Covering suicide carefully can change perceptions, dispel myths and inform the public on the complexities of the issue.
Team UP
Social Media Guidelines for Mental Health Promotion
The Entertainment Industries Council’s TEAM Up Social Media Guidelines for Mental Health Promotion and Suicide Prevention provide tips for organizations and individuals communicating about mental health and suicide on social media to reduce stigma, increase help seeking behavior and help prevent suicide.
Suicide Awareness Voices of Education (SAVE)
Recommendations for Blogging on Suicide
Suicide is an important public health issue, and those who blog on the topic share diverse perspectives, backgrounds and experiences that can help those who are struggling. However, it’s important to note that readers’ attitudes and behaviors can be influenced by what and how you write about suicide, mental health, crisis, and suicidal ideation-- both negatively and positively. The following recommendations are meant to assist bloggers in blogging about suicide safely, and ultimately maximize the effectiveness of the bloggers’ efforts and reduce the risk of harmful effects of unsafe messaging on suicide.
American Association of Suicidology
Suicide Reporting Recommendations: Media as partners in suicide prevention
These guidelines provide updates from previously published national and international suicide reporting guidelines, along with updated recommendations for reporting on suicide using social media. They are not intended to limit press freedom but rather serve as an evidence-based resource for effective reporting on suicide.