Trauma Informed Care Toolkit

Each one of us has an opportunity to create a caring community at UWM that helps reduce the impact of these stressors. Despite how difficult the last few years have been and how complicated our work feels, we can each chose how we might engage with our staff and peers to develop a more compassionate, enjoyable work environment.

In recognition of these circumstances, the Campus Cares team has developed Trauma-Informed Teaching and Supervision Toolkits. These Toolkits utilize resources from the national higher education community, as well as materials developed here at UWM. They will help instructors gain awareness of how trauma can impact students (what to look for) and how to respond. These same lessons can also help faculty and staff interact with their colleagues who may be feeling stress, distress, and perhaps trauma.

The principles of trauma informed care are:

  • Safety
  • Trustworthiness & Transparency
  • Peer Support
  • Collaboration and Mutuality
  • Empowerment & Choice
  • Cultural Humility and Competency
Workshop
Campus Cares has developed a trauma informed care workshop, offered by Social Work Professor Dimitri Topitzes and Dean of Students Adam Jussel. You may request the workshop, for departmental and unit meetings or for student groups.
Schedule a Workshop

Trauma Informed Teaching Toolkit

A trauma-informed pedagogy is one that recognizes the existence and impact of trauma and works to prevent trauma and mitigate its negative effects. It recognizes that individual needs may differ and seeks to provide each individual with the support they need rather than imposing identical resources and inflexible expectations on all.

Engaging in trauma-informed teaching enhances learning, connection, creativity, and collaboration.

UWM instructors are uniquely positioned to create a culture of care for students. This process can begin through a review of collective practices and policies, with particular attention to course expectations and syllabi, to determine whether the policies promote equal treatment with minimal regard for differing circumstances or, conversely, allow or encourage equitable treatment based on a more holistic approach to a student’s situation and conditions that they need to be successful. A reshaping of department cultures to promote empathy for students’ diverse backgrounds and situations can foster institutional empathy.

Permission for flexibility with accountability needs to be built into the entire UWM culture and policies, and into departments, units, and individual courses. Trauma and stress impact folks in unique ways due to wide variations in exposure to trauma and stress, identities held, socioeconomic status, and available support and resources. For these reasons the University’s approach will need to be tailored to best address the diversity of student experiences.

It is possible to be both caring and to uphold high academic standards in the classroom; in fact, thoughtfully practiced trauma-informed teaching makes it more possible for students with varied needs to successfully achieve intended course learning outcomes. Infusing care into the classroom can It is possible to be both caring and uphold the academic rigor in the classroom.  Infusing care into the classroom can strengthen UWM’s community of care, leading to greater student retention and success.

Some suggested ways to integrate care into the classroom are:

  • Seek to understand; listen to student feedback about their learning needs and experiences in the course. Include an opening check-in at the start of the course, to give individual students a confidential way to share with you anything they’d like you to know that might affect their performance in the course. Throughout the term, incorporate regular brief check-ins to gather student feedback about how they’re experiencing course content and activities. Individual feedback can be gathered through Canvas surveys or on notecards collected at the end of a class period. Digital polling offers an efficient way to elicit immediate, anonymous feedback from the class as a whole..
  • Model vulnerability and self-care. Try sharing a little about your experiences, to the extent you are comfortable. Speak to what you do for self-care to combat stress. This can create pathways for reciprocal care and a supportive environment in the classroom. Offer grace and compassion, and give yourself the same.
  • Encourage self-care (physical, emotional and mental). Encourage self-care activities, including connecting with friends/social support networks, getting outside, meditating, getting physical activity, etc. You can also include mindfulness and breathing practices in class sessions as appropriate. Some faculty do breathing exercises before each class. Some examples are available here: https://uwm.edu/wellness/mindfulness/
  • Co-create the classroom space. Check in with your students while reviewing the syllabus and assignments to see when assignments should be due, when check-ins should occur, etc.  Alternatively, let students know early in the semester which items you have flexibility on, and which ones you don’t.
  • Foster connections and community. Use introductions, which enable students to connect with one another throughout the class, especially at the beginning of the semester. Social support is paramount in persevering through traumatic events, and building a community, even a small one in the classroom, is incredibly important.
  • Give flexibility with assignments, tests, etc. to the extent possible. Establish shared accountability when doing so (e.g., clear expectations associated with extensions or alterations to routine processes).
    • A majority of students believe deadlines should be flexible for extenuating circumstances; however, students also rely on deadlines for motivation or staying on track. Some flexibility is great, but structures and accountability can exist within that flexibility.
    • It’s often possible to “build in” flexibility, especially when courses are designed with frequent, low-stakes assessments. Examples of such built-in flexibility include: dropping the lowest score(s) and/or permitting students to skip an occasional small assignment; giving all students a “free pass” to submit an assignment late; setting due dates windows and or including “grace periods” in which students can still submit an assignment late without penalty.
  • Include student resources in your syllabus information, let students know that you can help connect them to resources, and empower them to reach out for help. Show students the Support U website for more specifics on resources or connect them with the Dean of Students Office: https://uwm.edu/student-support/

Additional Principles and Practices to Enhance Classroom Emotional Safety (PDF), adapted from the University of Buffalo.

Trauma Informed Supervision Toolkit

Campus leaders play a key role in creating and fostering a culture of care.  One way is through trauma-informed leadership and supervision.

Caring for your staff in an authentic and empathetic way will help staff thrive and excel, increase retention, and reduce burnout.  While trauma informed care is a good framework for approaching this, these tips are grounded in empathy, empowerment, safety, transparency, while recognizing your employee’s individual needs.

Below are several easy, simple tips you can incorporate into your supervision to positively influence your area’s culture.  If you have landed here and don’t know where to start, check out the questions for supervising with care during one-on-ones.

A trauma-informed lens can enhance our approach to supervision in several ways. Operating from a trauma-informed lens allows supervisors to have a more individualized and supportive relationship with their employees. This affords a greater ability to cultivate strengths and provide individualized responses when an employee may be struggling. Also, a component of trauma informed care is that organizations, like UWM, can create spaces for meaningful, albeit sometimes difficult, conversations, and to mitigate the impacts of personally experienced and vicarious trauma (Walsh, 2017).

A supervisor is not a counselor, and you will need to recognize the limits of your role, set up boundaries, gain education to more clearly understand others’ challenges, and making appropriate referrals and connections to resources.

For an easy starting point, use these questions (PDF) as a place to start caring communications with your team.

First, before engaging in these, practice self-care. This might include engaging in any of the practices below for yourself, setting set times for reflection, self-care, or engagement with others, look to pathways for earned success, etc. You cannot care for others unless you care for yourself.

  1. Orient your area towards shared values
    • Develop shared values and purpose through conversations with staff. It helps everyone consider what role they play in that core purpose. Once shared values and purpose are established, remain committed to them, keep them in front of mind in conversations, communications, hiring, retention, promotion, etc.
    • Discuss these values during meetings, including one-on-ones.
      • Follow a distributed leadership approach that focuses more on shared goals than on rigid adherence to the organizational chart.
      • Break free from the default “the way we’ve always done….” mindset. If that is the rationale for the way something is done, probe more and ask why.
  2. Allow time for deep, meaningful work with others, even if it is outside of the unit or area
    • Provide for opportunities for staff to work on projects that are A. meaningful to them and/or the team; B. Shared and collaborative with others, including others outside the unit; and C. In furtherance of the larger goal (e.g., supporting students)
  3. Practice good communications
    • Communicate regularly to engender trust and transparency with staff.
    • Empathy is key. Starting with a people-first and care-first approach in all communications is helpful, even if the news itself is troubling.
    • In times of change, be clear about what is not changing, despite any volatility of current circumstances. Share accurate, timely, and transparent information. Communicate next steps in a process when waiting on answers.
    • Acknowledge staff and celebrate successes: Reinforce the behaviors and values that are considered vital to improving outcomes, including that successful crisis response relies on leadership and contributions from everyone in the organization.
    • Create feedback loop opportunities, formal and informal, whether in one-on-ones or in team meetings.
    • Empower employees and create safe spaces to bring up concerns or needs.
    • Seek to understand. Make sure to check-in with staff, faculty, and students without assumptions; this can go a long way to creating a supportive environment. Revisit how often a check-in would be appreciated. Practice offering grace and compassion to others and give yourself the same.
  4. Consider physical spaces
    • Involve employees in discussions about their workspaces. Engage in conversations about physical space and increasing personal comfort in offices as well as meeting spaces.
  5. Support mental health and wellbeing
    • Encourage self-care (physical, emotional and mental), and integrate it into your office or unit’s practices (e.g., set days/times dedicated to self-care). Other self-care strategies include having separate interests and passions from work, taking breaks, maintaining connections with people outside the field, humor, and being active in a socio-political movement (Morrison, 2007). Promote and model self-care for yourself.
    • Share or identify common language for “I’m not doing well.” Some staff use a % to identify where they are at and how they are feeling, or a “red, yellow, green,” – this enables folks to share where they are at without sharing details theey aren’t comfortable with, but builds avenues for understanding and support.
    • Use mindfulness and breathing as appropriate.
    • Ensure that employees know what resources are available.
    • UWM has an Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for additional mental health support.  The EAP website provides tools and information to address life’s everyday concerns. Kepro is anonymous, confidential, and secure. You will find research articles, self-paced training, monthly webinars, legal and financial resources, and much more. https://uwm.edu/hr/eap/
  6. Build Community
    • Social support is paramount in persevering through traumatic events. Building a community in the workplace, no matter the size of your team, is incredibly important, and should be genuine and align with departmental values and mission.
    • Some suggestions: Meeting for lunch with a colleague, taking a short walk to grab coffee with someone in your workspace, joining a committee that works on items that you are passionate about, join a class after work, such as a cooking or exercise class.
  7. Offer flexibility
    • Offer flexibility when you can, with consideration that this will differ per position description. Flexible schedules or alterations to identified work expectations may be helpful here.
    • Allow employees to step away from workspace to regroup or clear their minds. A workday walk or lunch away from the office are ways to flex the workday that should beencouraged when possible.
    • Organizationally, you can provide staff with balanced workloads/work types, debrief with staff (if they want to) after difficult conversations, and create a supportive culture that acknowledges and normalizes feelings, and emotions.

Adapted in part from Guidance for Health Care Leaders during Recovery Stage of the COVID-19 Pandemic – Recovery Stage by Gerts, et. Al. and from research and writing done by Campus Cares.