Teachers' bereavement experiences after the sudden and violent death of a student: an exploration of lived experiences

Abstract

Following the deaths of students, teachers have expectations to be grieving role models and perform similar roles to helping professionals when they care and support grieving children (Rowling, 1995). Yet teachers’ bereavement is sparsely documented in academic literature. This research focuses on discovering more about the bereavement experiences of teachers who have their student(s) die suddenly and violently. After five individual, semi-structured interviews, five thematic categories emerged: (1) So Much More Than Teaching; (2) Student Death Lifts the Curriculum Veil; (3) Place of Work, Place of Grief, Place of Being; (4) Teachers May Not Wave for Help on the Healing Journey; and (5) No Two Sudden Deaths Are the Same. Death and difficulty go together in unique ways with teachers who lose a student to death, but there are narratives of others, research, and practical supports by administration, counselling, teacher educators, and colleagues that can mediate grief in healthier ways.