10-Step Guide:Organizing Your School For A Terrorist Attack

by Susan Bodnar, Ph.D

It was the first day of school in a NYC school. Parents anxiously anticipated their child's new year, new grade, and new abilities as they dropped them off at the classroom door, or hovered awkwardly in the class wondering how to say goodbye. Suddenly a mother's cell phone rang. Her face turned pale. "

Oh my God," she said. "A plane hit the World Trade Center." Gasps. Confusion. Another cell phone rang. Tears. Soon parents were huddled around a small radio in the conference room not knowing what to say or do. They could only wait.

New York City and Washington DC schools face serious and complex issues. In some schools, parents are missing. Students witnessed traumatic violence from classroom windows. Students everywhere have seen the attacks on TV. Whether the disaster struck on a personal or communal note school every school community faces the challenge of how to integrate this unprecedented event into everyday learning.

Right now the most important thing is to allow the tears. Cry, cry and cry some more. Provide love, comfort, and support. Mobilize your community to help everyone. Feel with your hearts and reach out with open arms. These are the dark days of unthinkable destruction.

Before your tears even dry you must then utilize unflappable courage to re-establish the normal routines and structures of the school environment. Then, as time goes on, a teacher may discover a student who has become obsessed with drawing burning towers. Some students may have trouble concentrating, or finishing assignments.

Some teachers may find themselves easily fatigued and less energetic. Parents might be have increasing complaints about child safety, or may find it harder to trust the teachers in the classroom. Some will have lost their jobs. If appropriate care-taking networks exist within the community these problems can be addressed in a healing manner.

The only way to recover your school from the ravages of the terrorist attack on the United States is to create a compassionate community within the school environment. The following is a ten-step guide for how to establish a community care-taking network in your school.

1. Know Your Community.

   Every school is collection of subcultures, especially among the student body. The terrorist trauma will have affected every school differently, and it will have affected the school's various subcultures differently.

   As soon as the head of the school re-establishes normal school routines he or she should initiate a Focus group. Include teachers, administrators, mental health staff, medical personnel, parents, custodial staff (They are often very informed about students' secret lives) and even some adolescent age students from different cliques (if applicable).

   Include personnel from every grade in the school. Use this meeting to check in. Find out what people have noticed and observed. Discuss the characteristics of all the community members and think about how each has reacted to past difficult moments. Identify which strategies have worked and which have failed. Pay attention to specific students who may have specialized needs.

2. Create A Statement.

   When this focus meeting (or meetings) is completed turn your findings into a position paper. Summarize who you are as a school and state your philosophic values. In the context of those values list discuss your sense of what the long-term issues might be and make sure you include reference to ongoing current events.

   Identify the strategies you will use to address anticipated problems. For example your statement might include something like this: "In the past we have found that our fourth graders may become overly consumed with violent video games when exposed to stressful circumstances. We ask all parents to limit but not prohibit video game playing to 1/2 an hour per day.

   Ask your child what feels good about the games and then try to substitute other activities like sports. In this instance a rough game of soccer or football is a more integrated and healthier expression of aggression than repeated exposure to violent imagery. Physical activity helps to release tension rather than video games that induce more tension and create an increased need for the game.

   In the classroom we will be talking about violent imagery and the school psychologist will do a presentation to the fourth grade classrooms." Remember this is an example. You have to look to your own school for the types of things you anticipate.

3. Set Up Adult-only Opportunities To Study The Impact Of Terrorism On Communities.

   Do not arrange process groups or discussion forums. People will be more responsive to organized and bounded opportunities for the exploration for what has happened in their lives. Invite college professors or parents who are terror experts.

   Show movies that deal with similar events. Have the principal speak on school safety or a parent discuss the impact of terrorism on local businesses - this way everybody is gently informed about what different members of the community are experiencing.

   During these meetings give people to discuss their responses and don't cut anybody off. Let the discussion take its own direction. If people feel ready to express themselves, they will. Let it happen. Make sure you have one of your mental health personnel present but don't make them too obvious. Allow them to be a relaxed presence in the room who may or may not gently facilitate.

4. Establish Informal Opportunities For Gathering.

   Initiate a Friday coffee hour when teachers and other staff have breaks. Ask a parent to set up a grade-wide phone tree. Ask the PTA or Parents Association to arrange fun get-togethers for the parents, and to keep track on how individual families are doing. Again, enable and support spontaneous discussions. You provide the structure. Allow the relationships to grow on their own.

5. Support Local Civic Organizations.

   Nurture the community organizations that have in the past or may in the future be responsible for protecting your school. Take out ads to complement rescue workers, fire fighters and police. Celebrate their work.

6. Model What Happens In The Adult Community In The Child Community.

   Don't make students process events before they are ready. Arrange for firefighters to visit the classes. Ask parents to give presentations about how their professional lives have been affected by the terrorism. Provide informal opportunities for gathering like apple picking events, team sports, and school dances.

7. What To Say To Children.

   Listen to the children. For children five and under, teachers should respond only to verbalized material. Teachers should repeat what they are in a positive and engaged manner. Answer questions honestly and simply. Engage the child's intellect. Use words that indicate that this was an unusual event. Make sure no preschool child mistakenly thinks that they did something wrong.

    
   For younger elementary age children it is useful to work on projects that demonstrate the triumph of good over evil. Take supplies to a firehouse. Send letters to the president. Become pen pals with children in NYC schools, or if in New York, become pen pals with children outside of New York.
    
   Children ten and older and ready to embark on more philosophical journeys. Set up debating teams and discussion groups. Depending on individual children and classes introduce complicated topics like US Foreign Policy. Do not pretend that the United States as infallible. Do describe terrorist responses as unconscionable. Make sure kids see that the things that are wrong with the US are not really what prompted the terrorist attack.

8. Hang On Tight.

   Understand that any child, anywhere, will be affected by what has happened. The terror attack will have affected students at Stuyvesant High School in New York City (located a few blocks north of ground zero) differently than students in Anchorage Alaska or Rome, Italy - but they will be affected.

    
   It will change their perspective on how they view safety, boundaries and relationships. Expect behavioral changes in all children. Anticipate students who are already vulnerable. Grab them before they fall further. Don't let go. Psychologists, psychiatrists, and social workers are excellent resources for the child and for you. Tough love also works.
    
   True interest and faith in a student, however, are the unprecedented acts that can save a student's life. Educators and support staffs are the most important people in a child's external world. Even if other people take your work for granted don't you dare. All school personnel should remind themselves everyday that they are the most important people in the world.

9. Find A Collective Project To Work On Together.

   Build a memorial garden in a nearby park. Create a sculpture. Plant a tree. Involve everybody - students, teachers, parents, administrators, support and custodial staff, and professionals affiliated with the school.

10. Empower All Members Of The Community By Nurturing Existing Relationships.

    People overcome attacks and trauma by re-experiencing their efficacy in the world. Make sure everybody has a role to play in rebuilding the school community.

About the Author:

Susan Bodnar, Ph.D. is a New York City clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst with anthropological training. She has collaborated with groups that have experienced trauma to support the development of care-taking initiatives within their own communities.