Immigration at the southern border of the United States has a complicated history. This article focuses on youth who have arrived in the United States via the southern border. It is important to note that within that population, youth will have a wide variety of experiences with immigration depending on their family, community, and personal…

The National Association of School Psychologists' (NASP) Social Justice Committee (SJC) presents a National Book Read to encourage school psychologists and graduate students to come together around a selected text and participate in dialogues within their communities. This annual event, which is accompanied by a range of helpful resources to…

A school psychologist with a traditional role may fill their days with assessments, consultation, prevention work, and mental health supports. They are also have an extremely important role as crisis response leaders when schools are impacted by some type of acute traumatic experience. Such events have the potential to significantly impact the…

Within classrooms and school settings, school psychologists are positioned to make significant impact through providing education and advocacy around the practices that support equity-centered, trauma-informed care. This article explores how school psychologists and other school-based professionals can advocate for youth who have been exposed to…

In recent years, more and more information has emerged about the high prevalence and impact of childhood trauma. In response to many calls for more work and more resources on how best to support trauma-exposed youth, the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) Social Justice Committee selected this topic as its programmatic focus for…

In schools, Indigenous students are more likely to receive exclusionary discipline and special education services related to emotional disturbance while the Indigenous concepts of disability and historical trauma often go unnoticed. This article provides an overview of the culturally responsive considerations practitioners should be cognizant of…

Race-based traumatic stress, also called racial trauma, refers to "mental and emotional injury caused by encounters with racial bias and ethnic discrimination, racism, and hate crimes" (Mental Health America, n.d.). While much research on racism-based stress in schools focuses on teachers, school psychologists can just as easily cause…

Empirical investigations have found trauma to be disproportionately concentrated in and experienced by minoritized communities (Gherardi et al., 2020; Muldoon et al., 2021). Although trauma also occurs as a result of natural disasters or accidental events, the effects of these traumas tend to be less severe than those resulting from events of…

The consequences of the tragic school shooting on May 24, 2022 at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas will reverberate for decades to come. Trauma on this level affects the survivors and bystanders who directly witnessed tragedy unfold on the school campus, families, friends, and first responders, as well as entire communities and onlookers…

Today we are living in an era of two pandemics--the COVID-19 global health pandemic and the racial inequity pandemic--and at the same time, anxiety over school shootings is increasing. When assessing school-based threats of violence, equitable procedures and protocols are needed to guide decision-making and ensure that high-level interventions are…

The United States has recently experienced numerous large-scale crises that resulted in high death tolls and extensive property damage. Critical incidents such as suicide contagion, natural disasters, or mass casualty events have the potential to cause traumatic reactions and significantly affect children's sense of safety and security. School…

The COVID-19 pandemic thrust the field of school psychology into unchartered territory--navigating how to continue to serve students in need via a virtual format while attempting to adhere to best practices. During this time, the team at Indiana University began implementing trauma-informed multitiered systems of support (TI-MTSS), more…

Food insecurity is a nationwide, systemic epidemic that effects millions of students on a daily basis. Without intervention, food insecure youth are left to contend with physical, cognitive, social-emotional, and academic losses. This article reviews the impacts of food insecurity on student development and the ethical obligations of the field to…

Traumatic stress has long been a source of interest for researchers and practitioners, and recently there has been an increase in federal and state legislative support for trauma-informed care (Maul, 2017). Globally, the need for trauma services has been pushed to the foreground as the myriad of negative outcomes associated with the COVID-19…

Given the high number of immigrant youth in the United States that are from Latinx backgrounds and given that these youth are at risk for experiencing traumatic events during their migration, it is critical for school mental health providers to understand how to best serve this population. To do so, they must first understand how the unique…