The school crisis team takes part in paying very important roles in such situations as multicultural crisis response and there should be selection of appropriate teams (Silver & Klotz, 2007). Where possible, the members of this team have to stand in for the linguistic as well as cultural composition of the community that forms the school. In a situation where this is not attainable, the team is supposed to offer training and set up powerful working links with the external cultural brokers as well as interpreters, and the suitable members of the community who are ready to receive training in order to help during a crisis (Silver & Klotz, 2007).
Whenever there is occurrence of a crisis, such as a school shooting, the school principals as well as other responders are supposed to know that those who survive the crisis react to the crisis and recover from it within the context of the individual viewpoints, background and values they have. Depending on the extent of the crisis, the crisis team members may be offering a response to the student needs from a variety of cultures; in the immediate as well as aftermath of the incident and all through the process of recovering. It is pointed out that “expression of emotion, description of psychological symptoms, help-seeking behaviors, natural support networks, and customs in dealing with trauma, loss, and healing often vary by culture” (Silver & Klotz, 2007, p.12). It is very much imperative to put into consideration past influences like economic as well as social disparity, favouritism and racial discrimination, and also war when undertaking the preparation for offering response to a crisis. Such factors may contribute towards having the minority groups not trusting the assistance that they may be offered and they can become annoyed, point fingers at other people and may not have full right to use resources. Moreover, the people or groups of people that may have previously gone through trauma like the refugees and also those people who may have limited access to resources can be more prone to injury from the crises (Silver & Klotz, 2007, p.12).
The crises that may occur in school, such as a school shooting, which involve death present more challenges of getting to understand the cultural as well as religious attitudes of the surviving students towards death and offering support to their process of moaning. The perceptions differ greatly and the school staffs are supposed to keenly consider the perspectives as well as the faith traditions of these students (Goldston, 2008). The greatest thing or step the principal can take is to respect the views as well as wishes of the families of students and ensure involvement of the family members in the process of support (Goldston, 2008). The schools may wish to ensure incorporation of the religious or spiritual ceremonies in the activities of recovery; this depends on the nature of the crisis that might have occurred. Deciding on this is dependent on, to a large extent, the conditions as well as the cultures that are represented within the school. In whichever the case, the community, the families and the students have to be involved in the planning process of these activities (Silver & Klotz, 2007, p.12). This can enable to clear any problems that may come up and the whole situation will be handling effectively.
References
Goldston, D. B.et al, (2008). Cultural considerations in adolescent suicide prevention and psychosocial treatment. American Psychologist, 63(1), 14-31.
Silver, A. & Klotz, M. B. (2007). Culturally competent crisis response. Student Counselling, 1(1), 11 – 15.