Trauma-Informed Approaches
We undertook a collaborative exchange that saw Dr Emily Berger spend a week at University of Warwick in June 2024. Helen then travelled to Monash for a week of collaborative working in September 2024. This exchange was part of our initial project to design and deliver trauma-informed professional learning resources and training for both Warwick and Monash, and which was supported by the Director of Teaching and Learning and Provost at Monash. These exchange visits provided excellent opportunities for collaboration and critical discussion of trauma-informed practice and approaches in our respective disciplines in our organisations.
Manage classroom tension and conflict - Learning and Teaching: Teach HQ
During Emily’s visit to Warwick, we delivered a WIHEA Masterclass entitled WIHEA Masterclass - Exploring Trauma-informed Approaches in Higher Education to Warwick staff and students which was positively received. Participant feedback indicated that the masterclass was influential in shaping academic and extracurricular endeavours.
Emily also delivered a thought-provoking session at WMS, sharing her experiences of stakeholder engagement to inform education and research practice. We also developed and recorded information videos to accompany the resources we created for Monash Teach HQ on trauma-informed de-escalation of classroom conflicts.
Helen's visit to Monash saw us deliver a multi-disciplinary panel event as part of Monash EDI week. This event, which included speakers from disciplines including healthcare professions education, psychology, education, legal studies and student support services, had excellent attendance and stimulated rich discussion regarding opportunities for building trauma-informed practice across our institutions.
During this week Helen also delivered a faculty development session on the area of trauma-informed research practice at the School of Educational Psychology and Counselling, Monash University, and met with colleagues from various Monash disciplines to share practice and experiences on trauma-informed practice.
We have continued to progress our work in trauma-informed practice and pedagogy e.g. by developing a literature review of this practice in higher education internationally which will inform our next steps.
Building on these outputs completed so far, we are delighted to have been awarded a further grant under the Monash Warwick Alliance Education Fund for our proposed project; Trauma-informed pedagogy and practice in tertiary settings. This project, which will also incorporate scholars in trauma-informed practice at Penn State University, seeks to build practice higher education through stakeholder engagement. This project will commence in the coming months.
We are grateful for the support received from WMS, University of Warwick and Monash University colleagues in supporting our exchange activities, in particular to Richard Clay, Craig Summerton, Samantha Johnson, Grahame Flanagan, Professor Leti Gramaglia and the WIHEA and MWA teams at Warwick and Dr Tim Fawns, Fiona Marshall, Roanne Sperring and Professor Andrea Reupert at Monash.