Quarterly Meeting Minutes: July 2023, Grief Expression/Response Presentation

 TOPIC

QUESTIONS

ACTION ITEMS, RECOMMENDATIONS and NOTES

Celeste Peart - called to order at 6:30 p.m.

b) Program Developments

Recruitment Efforts

-and-

Capacity Updates

Highlights - Reviewed summary.

DE BEST Volunteer Total: 335 volunteers

• Recruitment: 8 new volunteers
• Purged Volunteers that did not meet volunteer requirements this quarter: 2

Required trainings completed by volunteers (to date):

• Crisis Counseling "CCP" Training (various formats) (1 new) 89
• Psychological First Aid (various formats) (3 new) 102
• Skills for Psychological Recovery 21 
• IS-100.C: Introduction to Incident Command System 55
• IS-700.B: Intro to the National Incident Management System 29
• First Aid/CPR Certified (1 new) 21
• Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) 23

Outreach & Deployments

Highlights - Reviewed summary.

Community Resilience Initiatives:

• Blue Rocks/ DEMA Emergency Preparedness Night: 6/16 (8 shifts, 22 hours)
• DEVOAD Quarterly Meeting/DE BEST Disaster Mental Health Presentation: 6/20 (3 participants)
  • Thank you, Enrico De Gironimo for Sharing Knowledge with our partners!

Deployments and Ongoing Responses:

• Emergency Deployment and Response for Sussex County 4/1 Tornado (Response: 4/2-4/19, 10 shifts, 43.25 hours)

d) Program Development:

Volunteer Engagement Events, Meetings and Trainings 

Highlights - Reviewed summary.

Volunteer Team Meetings Last Quarter:

• DE BEST Quarterly Meeting, 4/12 (10 attendees)
• DE BEST Committee Meeting, 5/31 (12 attendees)

Volunteer Engagements Events:

• 2023 RespondDE's Annual Volunteer Recognition Event, 4/19 (13 attendees)

Facilitated Volunteers Trainings:

• "Intro To Trauma Informed Approach" Workshop (2.25 hours), 5/16 (29 attendees)

e) Presentation: Training Minute

Grief Responses in Early Life Stages by Anthony Policastro

Highlights - Reviewed typical reactions a child would experience from a school shooting ranging from different age groups.

Anthony shared video examples of a reaction from a Kindergarten/First grade perspective, Elementary school, and High School perspective in order to demonstrate how they might express grief. Participants received a brief review of the 5 stages of grief and their corresponding needs indicated by such expression/s: Recognize, React, Recollect, Relinquish, Readjust, and Reinvest. For a copy of the presentation: click here.

f) Presentation: Team Notes

DEBEST/GalaxyDigital.com

Volunteer Portal Review

Skylar reviewed DEBEST/GalaxyDigital.com how to: log your hours, update your profile, and update your qualifications (waivers, compliance and trainings).

Reminder: You must keep profiles on SERVDE, DETRAIN, and DEBEST/GalaxyDigital.com linked, accurate and up-to-date!

This will be a reoccurring training session, so if you are having trouble navigating the site you can reach out to Skylar at skywash@udel.edu to set up a training session. 

Upcoming Scheduled Activities:

• RespondDE Quarterly Task Force Meeting 7/12, 1:00 pm (staff, virtual)

• DE BEST Volunteer Quarterly Meeting 7/12, 6:30 pm (virtual)

• DE BEST Committee Meeting (Jan, March, May, July, Sept, Nov) 7/25, 6:30 pm (virtual)

• DE BEST 2023 Annual Volunteer Summer Potluck (2-3 hours, in person) 9/24, 1:00 pm (tentative)

• IAEM 2023 "Emergency Management: Turning the Tide", Long Beach, CA 11/3-11/9 (staff, in person)

Action Item:

Location TBD for Summer Potluck

Stay active with DE BEST:

• Engagement/Participation of 4 hours
• Respond to all Call Downs
• Save email in Contacts: DEBESTvolunteers@gmail.com
• Complete Qualifications
• Regularly check/update email and DE BEST Volunteers Communications Portal: https://debest.galaxydigital.com/user/dashboard

Celeste called for adjournment at 7:30 p.m.

Next Quarterly Meeting is tentatively scheduled for:

July 13th, 2023, 6:30 pm - 7:30 pm