Post-Crisis Follow-Up and Counselling Resource Letters
Every crisis plan in circulation stops at the all-clear. Districts do not fail in the first hour — they have adrenaline and a protocol for that. They fail in week three, when the media have gone and the district has stopped writing but the community has not stopped needing it.
| Age band | Commonly seen | Seek additional help if |
|---|---|---|
| K–2 | Clinginess, regression in toileting or speech, sleep disruption, repetitive play about the event, asking the same question many times | Regression persists beyond four to six weeks, or the child cannot be separated at drop-off for more than two weeks |
| 3–5 | Somatic complaints (stomach aches, headaches), school refusal, irritability, difficulty concentrating, worry about recurrence | Physical complaints persist with no medical cause, or school refusal lasts more than a week |
| 6–8 | Withdrawal from friends, sleep and appetite change, intense peer grief including in students who were not close, risk-taking, preoccupation with details | Withdrawal from all activities, marked drop in grades sustained past a month, or any talk of not wanting to be here |
| 9–12 | Anger, minimising, substance use, sustained low mood, online memorialisation, delayed reaction weeks later | Substance use begins or increases, any expression of hopelessness, or a marked change that lasts beyond a month |
| Staff and adults | Exhaustion, guilt, hypervigilance, irritability at home, delayed grief that arrives once students are settled | It is affecting sleep or home life at three to four weeks — and note that adults in schools reliably ask later than they should |
Adapted from published guidance from NASP and the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement. This is orientation for families, not a diagnostic instrument. Any concern is a reason to call a counsellor, and no threshold has to be met first.
Ten letters on a calendar
Day 2 — the first full day back
"Today was the first full day back at [SCHOOL]. Here is how it went: [HONEST ACCOUNT]. [N] counsellors were in the building and will be tomorrow. Your child may be fine tonight and not fine on Thursday. Both are normal and neither means anything is wrong."
Day 3 — counsellors on site
Names the counsellors, where they are, the hours, and that students may go without asking or explaining. Include how a parent requests a check-in for their own child, and make it a phone number rather than a form.
End of week 1
What has changed and what has not. Where support continues next week. The first honest acknowledgement that some students have not reacted yet, and that this is expected rather than concerning.
Week 2 — the one most districts skip
"Two weeks on, the visible response has wound down and our community is still working through this. Support at [LOCATION] continues through [DATE]. If your child's sleep, appetite, mood or willingness to come to school has changed in the last fortnight, call [COUNSELLOR] at [NUMBER] rather than waiting to see. Waiting to see is what most of us do and it is rarely the better choice."
Week 6
Short. Confirms whether on-site support continues, names the referral route to [COMMUNITY PROVIDER] for longer-term help, and says explicitly that it is not too late to ask.
Return to the building
If any space was closed: what has physically changed, what has not and why, when families may walk through before students return, and an assurance that a student who does not want to enter a particular room will be worked around rather than argued with.
Memorial or commemoration response
Your written policy, applied consistently, with the reasoning. Where the death was a suicide, the constraints on the postvention page govern and permanent memorials are advised against.
One month
What has been decided and changed since. What has not, with reasons. Any outstanding review and when it will report. Support access again, in full, because the family who needs it now deleted the day-one letter.
One year
Sent three to five days ahead of the date. What is planned, that participation is optional, where support will be on the day, and a note that anniversaries are frequently harder than people expect — including for students who seemed unaffected at the time and for staff who have never talked about it.
To the families of the most affected students
Individual, from a named person, not a broadcast. "You are on my list and you will stay on it. Here is my direct number. I will check in with you on [DATE] whether or not I hear from you."
Building the counselling resource block
Most counselling blocks fail because they are a list of national numbers. A block that gets used has a local name and a direct line in it. Build yours once, store it with your plan, and re-verify every August.
- District counsellors: name, building, room, hours, direct number. Not the switchboard.
- How a parent requests a check-in for their child: one number or one email address, staffed by a person.
- Local crisis centre: name, number, hours, and whether they take walk-ins.
- County or community mental-health access line, with the sliding-scale or no-insurance route stated plainly, because that is the barrier that stops the calls that matter.
- 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline: call or text, any hour, anywhere in the US.
- School-based telehealth, if you have it, with the consent step described in one sentence.
- Staff route: the employee assistance programme, named, with a number and the confidentiality position stated.
- Free reading: NASP's guidance on children and trauma, and the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement.
Write it at roughly a sixth-grade reading level and translate it in advance into the languages your district serves. A translated crisis number that arrives twenty minutes after the English one, unreviewed, is not equivalent access. Kastr renders the draft in the target languages before you send so a bilingual staff member can check it, and translation is included at every price tier rather than being an add-on module — but the human review is the part that matters.
Supporting staff, and closing the loop
The staff-support letter is the most commonly omitted document in this entire cluster. Teachers spend the crisis holding students and then go home, and the district's attention has usually moved on by the time their own reaction arrives.
What it contains: the employee assistance route with a number rather than a portal link; a named person coordinating cover; an explicit statement that taking a day is expected and not a favour; and the substitute arrangement, which is the practical thing that makes taking the day possible. Send it on day one and again at week two.
The after-action review closes the loop, and it happens on a scheduled date whether or not anything went wrong. Four questions worth putting on the form: what was the actual elapsed time from decision to first message; who had to be reached for approval and how long did that take; which message generated the most front-office calls, and what was missing from it; and what did families tell us they needed that we did not send. Keep the message log with it — every message, timestamp, audience and authoriser — because a serious incident produces records requests, and a log assembled six months afterwards from memory is worth very little. Kastr writes every send to a per-district append-only audit log with a SHA-256 hash chain, which is a log you can show was not edited after the fact rather than one you merely have.
Your own crisis plan, your counsel and your mental-health lead govern anything on this page. Nothing here is clinical advice.
Questions people actually ask
How long should a district keep communicating after a crisis?
Longer than feels necessary. A workable cadence is day two, day three, end of week one, week two, week six, one month and one year. Week two is the one most districts skip and the one where a meaningful share of families first realise they need help.
What should a counselling-resources letter actually contain?
A named counsellor with a direct number and hours, a single phone number for requesting a check-in, the local crisis centre, the county access line including the no-insurance route, 988, and the staff assistance route. National numbers alone do not get used. Write it at a sixth-grade reading level and translate it in advance.
How do we handle the one-year anniversary?
Send three to five days before the date rather than on it. Say what is planned, make participation optional, and name where support will be available on the day. Anniversaries are often harder than people expect, including for students who seemed unaffected at the time and for staff who have never talked about it.
What reactions are normal for children at each age after a crisis?
Younger children commonly show clinginess, regression and repetitive play; elementary-age children show somatic complaints and school refusal; middle-schoolers withdraw and grieve intensely in peer groups; older students may minimise, get angry, or react weeks later. Persistence beyond four to six weeks, any hopelessness and any new substance use are reasons to seek more help — but no threshold has to be met before calling a counsellor.
Do staff need a separate follow-up message?
Yes, on day one and again at week two. It should name the employee assistance route with a phone number, name the person coordinating cover, and state that taking a day is expected rather than tolerated. Staff grief in schools is under-supported precisely because the adults spend the crisis holding everyone else.
One price. Every feature. Locked for three years.
$3.50 per student per year under 5,000 students. No tiers, no add-on modules, no per-message fees. Published on the site because you should not have to book a call to learn a price.