When suicide invades the educational institution: loss and grief for suicide in the experience of students and educators
suicide; mourning; postvention; students; teachers; educational institutions
The number of violent and premature deaths among adolescents and young people in Brazil and in the world has been increasing, with suicide being the second leading cause of death for them worldwide. In view of this, death and mourning invariably invade the school space. When a student commits suicide, the impact is even greater, because in addition to being an unexpected, violent and stigmatized death, it involves a young person, generating even more commotion in the school community. Suicide impacts not only those closest to the deceased, but a large network of people who in the continuum of survival are among those exposed, affected and bereaved. Bereaved by suicide are more likely to develop emotional illness and to have suicidal behaviors, especially among adolescents and young people, which may favor suicide by contagion. Educators are also affected, but they do not find welcoming spaces and still feel unprepared to deal with their students in the face of this crisis situation. This study aims, therefore, to understand the experience of loss and grief among students and educators, in the face of student (s) suicide, in the educational context. The methodology used was qualitative with theoretical support of Gadamerian hermeneutics, through the instruments: narrative interview and projective scenes with students and educators who went through the experience of losing a student by suicide between 2011 and 2021. Six interviews were carried out with students ( enrolled and graduates), survivors of different suicides, between 17 and 22 years old, and with 3 teachers, from the Federal Institute of Rio Grande do Norte (IFRN) from 3 different campuses: Natal Central, Natal Cidade Alta and Parnamirim. The thesis was built in the form of articles. The first refers to an integrative review, entitled “Grief for suicide and postvention at school: an integrative review”, which sought in the literature the knowledge already produced about suicide and mourning by suicide at school, from the perspective of students and professionals. of education, from national and international articles. The results pointed to the need to consider the culture as well as the individual needs of survivors when designing postvention programs at school, as well as educational policies that ensure the prior implementation of crisis management plans. There was also a small production of studies that contemplated educators and, in Brazil and Latin America, a significant gap in relation to this theme. The second article “When mourning for suicide invades the school: the helplessness of students” identified the meaning of death by students as an inevitable end, a fresh start in spiritual life and a possibility of re-signifying living. The meaning of suicide, on the other hand, emerged as a choice in the face of despair and loneliness and not wanting to actually die; selfishness and lack of blame; as well as a result of the suicidal context in which we live. Its manifestations in relation to the impact of this loss occurred at the intrapersonal level (shock, some fears, anxiety, sadness, impotence, guilt and physical, cognitive and behavioral manifestations), interpersonal and transpersonal. Within the continuum of survival, students were among those exposed, affected and bereaved by suicide, demonstrating the need to be supported by the educational institution. The third, “Fighting suicide and postvention at school: the students’ coping strategies and the care they would like to receive”, identified that the adolescents/young people’s coping took place through conversations with friends, support from religiosity, in a solitary way. , with little and discontinuous institutional support. They highlighted the suicidal context that can drive suicide and also the sickening context after the impact of this death, in which they are torn between their own pain and the need to be support for other friends, who seem to be suffering even more. The fourth article entitled "When a student's suicide invades the educational institution: the invisible mourning of educators" we address the impacts of suicides at the inter, intra and transpersonal levels on teachers, showing that, depending on each of the suicide, they lie on the survival continuum between the exposed, affected, and bereaved (short term). However, they received little support related to suicide postvention by the institution, making them invisible in their pain and unprepared to deal with surviving students. Finally, the fifth article, “When student suicide invades the educational institution: confrontations of educators and postvention”, which discusses the confrontation of teachers: participation in a farewell ritual, help from peers and, in the absence of social support, the confrontation occurred in a solitary way. We also identified the institutional unpreparedness, the return to work without the necessary support, the disarticulation of the multiprofessional team and the absence of rituals about the student's legacy, making their mourning invisible. We conclude that it is essential to formulate previous suicide prevention programs in educational environments, which include students and educators, considering their specificities and needs, whether close to the deceased or not, cultural aspects, in addition to their location within the categories of the survival continuum, which will support the actions of care and prevention of suicidal behavior in those impacted by suicide in the context of educational institutions.