Chichester students produce child bereavement pack for teachers

Three students have produced a resource pack which advises teachers how to help bereaved children.

Jack Allen, Jo Grist and Sarah Hands, of Chichester University, worked with children’s charity The Sussex Snowdrop Trust to come up with the pack.

The charity, which provides nursing care at home for children with life-threatening or terminal illnesses, said the resource would “soon be recognised as an essential document for schools”.

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Called Promoting Empathy and Coping Strategies in Schools: A Living Resource Pack for Terminal Illness and Bereavement, the information is available for download from the Snowdrop Trust’s website.

Diana Levantine, Snowdrop’s co-founder and chairman, said: “I understand that bereavement or loss is not covered in the curriculum for teacher training courses and therefore this document is vital for their work as teachers.

“As a governor in my village school for many years, I am very aware of the emotional impact loss has on the progress of pupils and of the lack of advice, support and help there is for staff.

“We were keen to get involved to address this, and had several meetings together to discuss the needs of teachers and teacher’s assistants. The outcome has made the time spent so worthwhile.”

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As well as promoting the new information, Snowdrop’s family counsellor aims to visit all local primary and secondary schools in the charity’s catchment area to talk about these issues and present a bound copy of the resource pack.

To download the resource pack log on to www.thesussexsnowdroptrust.org