ABSTRACT
Crisis can stem from the actions of someone or something inside the school community—an internal crisis. The internal crisis most common to middle and high schools is a student death, resulting from an accident, violence, suicide, or, in rarer cases, illness. Student suicide in particular generates complex fallout for the community to process, bringing about matters of privacy, guilt, blame, and fear. Common issues when suicide occurs include faculty and staff feeling they should have been able to prevent the death, and feeling angry with the deceased for causing their own death. Developing supportive responses to students after a crisis begins with understanding how adolescents react to and process grief, trauma, or other major events that, while not as serious, affect school life. The most common complaints schools get from students and parents after a crisis are lack of communication and lack of transparency.
