Original Broadcast Date: 9/10/20
This session examines grief and the double pandemics of racial violence and COVID-19, including a discussion of ways that the double pandemics of COVID-19 and antiblackness inform grief, complex grief, and teaching and learning. Aaminah Norris and Babalwa Kwanele discuss the complexities of racism, how the loss caused by pandemics particularly influences and harms Black children, students, and families, and introduce possible healing strategies.
Download the slides HERE.
Dr. Aaminah Norris, Associate Professor at Sacramento State University, is Founder and CEO of UnHidden Voices LLC, a Black woman-owned educational consultancy with a mission of building empathy and disrupting the invisibility of Black children, students, and families. She has more than 25 years of experience supporting schools and non- profit organizations in addressing issues of educational equity for low-income students from historically marginalized communities. She researches, teaches, and advocates the digital literacies of Black girls and women, with a particular interest in their STEM practices, culturally responsive pedagogies particularly as they connect to maker education, and the pedagogies of Black women teachers.
Babalwa Kwanele is a licensed mental health therapist (LMFT), with over 30 years of professional experience working with culturally diverse youth, children, and families in community mental health and school - based settings. Her work and research has a special focus on prevention and intervention, with the goal of improving academic outcomes and the social determinants of health. She has extensively studied the neurobiology of trauma and the effects of racism and poverty on communities, families, individuals, and complex systems. Kwanele’s areas of specialization are complex multigenerational trauma, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), trauma-informed school based mental health, impact of secondary trauma on educators and learning, complex family systems, cultural humility, and culturally responsive care.
This webinar was one of the sessions of September's Grief Sensitivity Virtual Learning Institute (GSVLI). For more information on how to access resources from September's and November's GSVLI, please click here.
