Intro to Strategies for Trauma Awareness & Resilience

This training is offered pay-what-you-can in a partnership between Mennonite Healthcare Fellowship and Minnesota Peacebuilding Leadership Institute.

Introduction to Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience for Cultural Competence, Racial Healing and Equity Trauma-Informed Care for All of Us (Intro to STAR)

When terrible things happen, like COVID-19 and racism, our peace has been stolen from us. Intro to STAR teaches basic vocabulary and concepts to be trauma-informed, resilience-oriented, and restorative justice-focused to build culturally competent peace into our lives and communities with justice for all. Everyone from everywhere is welcome to join us.

Training Facilitator: Donna Minter, PhD, LP, Certified STAR Trainer, USA and International Experience, Neuropsychologist, Clinical Psychologist, and Forensic Psychology Examiner, Founder, Minnesota Peacebuilding Leadership Institute, and a Mennonite Healthcare Fellowship board director.

This 2-hour online training teaches the basic vocabulary, concepts, models, and strategies of the 5-day Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience - STAR Training to increase cultural competence for racial healing and equity. STAR is a research and practice-supported training integrating neuropsychology, trauma healing and resilience, restorative justice, nonviolent conflict transformation, and broadly defined spirituality. It is for those who wish to learn basic STAR concepts and models within a shorter-time frame than the single day STAR-Lite Training and the multi-day 38-hour STAR Training. Intro to STAR is not a pre-requisite or replacement for the STAR or STAR-Lite Trainings. It is designed for those wanting to understand and heal trauma toward building peace within their spheres of influence. This training is for everyone: laypeople, paraprofessionals, and licensed professionals.

This training is for laypeople, paraprofessionals, and licensed professionals. For licensed Minnesota mental health professionals, teachers, and nurses who want 2 hours of continuing education (CE) for this training, choose the registration option that includes the $25 CE fee.

If you wish to receive a Certificate of Completion for this training, please register with the option to pay the CE fee. Otherwise, the post-training email that you receive soon after the training will serve as confirmation that you attended this training. We are unable to provide a Certificate of Completion without payment.

Training objectives:

a. Learn the complete intersectional spectrum of individual and collective psychological trauma for increased cultural competence.

b. Learn and reflect on the links between unhealed trauma and cycles of victimhood and violence .

c. Learn and reflect on STAR's trauma healing and resilience models and associated practices.

d. Explore self-care for resilience strategies to build culturally competent peace into your life, family, and community to promote justice for all.

Please note: After you complete your Eventbrite registration, the day before the training and the morning of the training, Donna will email you PDF handouts in preparation for this training and the Zoom video conferencing online training link. Please check your Spam folder for an email from gemma@mnpeace.org if you cannot find these pre-training emails in your Inbox.

Cancellation Policy: Refunds for this training, less a $10 administrative fee, will be given if written cancellation is received from the registrant at least 24 hours during the Monday-Friday work week prior to the training . No tuition refund is offered after 48 hours prior to the training. Transfer of tuition to another online training is granted if written request is received at least 24 hours before the day of this training. Refunds or transfers are not available for no-shows. There is high demand for this training. If you realize you cannot attend, please contact us immediately at info@mnpeace.org to let us know. This will open your spot to another attendee. Thanks!

Intro to STAR Training Background, Strategies, and Guidelines

This online Intro to STAR Training is designed for those wanting to understand psychological trauma and move toward building peace within their spheres of influence. Our trainees come from a wide variety of backgrounds; we represent different political leanings, cultural practices, religious traditions and understandings of spirituality and spiritual practices. Introduction to STAR is a online training based on the STAR program that originated at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University, Harrisonburg, VA. Mennonites are an historic peace church denomination, which is Christian but neither Catholic nor Protestant. Intro to STAR, STAR-Lite, and the STAR Trainings are not religious programs and warmly welcome people from all backgrounds.

As you can imagine, rich diversity makes a dynamic learning environment as we explore issues of trauma, security, justice, and peacebuilding and relate it to our own contexts. In order to create an optimal learning environment, please take time to read the following understandings.

STAR recognize that trauma affects body, mind, and spirit and addresses all of these aspects. Trauma hits us where we are most vulnerable and makes chaos out of the order of our lives. Healing processes need to address body, mind and spirit. As human beings, it is normal for those coming from a spiritual tradition to seek comfort and reassurance from their faith at such times or to address deep questions of meaning. All of us are aware of the religious tensions that exist in our world today. Your online training group will likely be a microcosm of this world and we see it as a rich opportunity to learn from one another and build bridges of understanding.

STAR is conducted as a multi-cultural, multi-faith gathering in which each trainee is given the safety and space to interact with the content freely using the language of their own culture and faith tradition, spiritual practice, or nonreligious ritual. We ask that you exercise respect and sensitivity in this and at all times, speak only for yourself.

We have also found that, given the diversity of people who join us, many issues, both individual and structural, could be used as case studies of trauma and the resulting cycles of victimhood, oppression, and violence. Because of the complexity, long history, and emotional intensity of such issues, getting centered on any one could result in diversion from the objectives for the training and jeopardize the online learning atmosphere for others. Therefore, for the emotional safety of the group, we ask that the online training not be used as a platform for the promotion of a particular theological, ideological, or political issue.

Intro to STAR is an educational event. Many trainees have found the training to be therapeutic, but the trianing is not designed to be therapy. The interactions are designed to illustrate ways of addressing trauma and practicing resilience toward building peace within one’s sphere of influence; the academic input is educational in nature -- neither should be used as diagnostic or professional treatment tools. Any concerns you have about psychological issues should be discussed with a qualified mental health professional. If you have questions about this during the training, please discuss them with our staff.

From these understandings, we offer the following strategies:

a. See our time together as an opportunity to stretch and grow, owning that many of us have much to learn about other people’s cultures and traditions.

b. Speak for yourself rather than being prescriptive for the group.

c. Share who you are, but refrain from theological, cultural and philosophical debates and proselytizing.

d. Use the “ouch, then educate” principle if someone says something that offends or hurts, e.g. “Ouch, making that generalization about Africans, Muslims, Americans, etc. reinforces tired, outdated stereotypes. In fact...”

e. Assume that no one in the group is deliberately wanting to hurt or degrade your faith or people. Tell personal stories to illustrate why you feel a certain way about something controversial rather than making general statements or pronouncements.

g. Ask rather than make statements about another’s culture or faith tradition, e.g. “I understand that Hindus…Am I correct?” “Is it true that in your community you …?”

MN Peacebuilding staff reserves the right to ask a trainee to withdraw from the training early if, based on our experience and judgment, their disruptive conduct jeopardizes the group’s educational experience.

This training and all of Peacebuilding's trainings are available by contract arrangement for community groups, educational institutions, nonprofit organizations, corporations, and state and federal agencies.

The content of this training is based on the STAR (Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience) Program, Eastern Mennonite University, Harrisonburg, VA, USA. www.emu.edu/cjp/star