Culturally informed responses to grief and loss in a fractured world: Implications for school social work in African contexts

Abstract

School Social Workers (SSWs) are in a unique position to respond to systemic forms of grief and loss. Most interventions rarely consider the larger social context or how racialized experiences impact both the types of grief and loss learners experience, as well as how schools respond to their grief. The Culturally Informed Response to Grief and Loss Certificate (CIRGL) aims to fill this gap by providing an online, asynchronous professional development program that centres the lived experiences of minoritized youth and asks professionals to critically examine their own biases. This paper shares the results of the evaluation of the Train the Trainer component of CIRGL. The results affirm CIRGL’s core premise that grief and loss cannot be understood, or healed, solely at the individual level, but require culturally informed responses that honour grief as a collective, intersectional, and systemic experience. Results indicate that practitioners describe a significant shift from avoidance to active engagement, reflection, and a compassionate approach to grief. CIRGL expanded their understanding of grief to include losses such as those related to harsh immigration enforcement, racialized violence, and economic instability. Finally, this paper considers the implications of these findings for application in an African context. 

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