Educator Recovery
What We Learned from Mending Our Wounds & our Summer Listening Sessions
What does recovery from, through, and after crises mean for educators? What might our school leaders be experiencing as individuals, as teams, as a body of professionals navigating our collective overwhelm?
In the summer of 2021, we hosted our Summer Institute “Mending Our Wounds: Recovering Through Art & Ritual,” a space for educators to process the past year and steady themselves for the space of the summer.
We also hosted two listening spaces for educators across the country to join, find each other, share their challenges and celebrations in accessing space to consider accessing recovery.
We offer this summary of our learning in and from these spaces to center educator voice as our country contemplates creating the conditions and climates for our school crisis recovery to be possible.
“Recovery can take place only within the context of relationships; it cannot occur in isolation…These include the basic capacities for trust, autonomy,
initiative, competence, identity, and intimacy.”
Judith Herman
187 educators from across the country gathered virtually to interrupt isolation and experience the intimacy of reflecting on this past year to engage in creative outlets to foster healing and to share their experiences.
Our Learnings
There are two parts to this learning capture; each includes written summaries and a visual capture by Rio Holaday to facilitate capacity and sustainability of the learning.
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Part 1 highlights our learning from Mending Our Wounds: Recovering from School Crisis through Art & Ritual.
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Part 2 highlights our learning from Listening Into Voices from the Field: Educator Reflections on COVID-Looking Back to Look Ahead (fueled by June 2021 and August 2021 listening sessions).
