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1. Why do you need a critical incident plan for international students?
What is a critical incident?
ISANA defines a critical incident as being:
‘A tragic or traumatic event or situation affecting a student/students which has the potential to cause unusually strong emotional reactions in the school/campus community.’
All educational institutions have their own institution-wide critical incident plans, however, such plans may not meet the individual needs of international students during a critical incident. Consideration of our legal, contractual and our pastoral obligations clarify why we need an international student component to any institution critical incident plan.
Legal obligations
Emergency plans are mandatory for all educational institutions. The Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice 2021 sets out our legal obligations to have critical incident plans in place for tertiary domestic learners and all international learners.
Contractual obligations
The Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice 2021 sets out the contractual obligations needed to ensure appropriate measures are in place to provide support to our international students during a critical incident. See section 3A below for relevant sections of the Code. Obligations include ensuring that international students have insurance that will cover them in the event of serious injury, in addition to death cover. Also needed is a robust Refund Policy in the event of your institution being unable to offer instruction as a result of a critical incident.
A good reason to have a Refund Policy
“We had a debrief about a month after the earthquake and the one thing it highlighted was the strength of our Refund Policy. We had to offer refunds as we could not offer instruction at our site or guarantee safety in Christchurch. We worked with agents and clients to move their students to other schools around the country. Those institutions had confidence in our Refund Policy knowing that we would refund our students’ fees so that students could transfer to new schools immediately. This provided reassurance to students’ parents and to the students that they could remain in New Zealand for their studies.”
Penny O’Connell, International Student Director, Halswell School, Christchurch
You need to ensure that your enrolment contract sets out your institution’s and the international student’s parents’ (under 18 years) obligations in the event of a critical incident.
Contractual responsibilities around duty of care
“It is so important that your enrolment contract sets out your institution’s and the parents’ responsibilities around duty of care in the event of a critical incident. This includes visiting group course students. You need to highlight that your institution is responsible for the welfare of your visiting students and not their agent. We had a group of international primary aged students who were meant to be visiting an activity with their organiser on the day of the Christchurch earthquake. We tried to locate them there afterwards and they were not there and we subsequently found out that they had visited their agent’s office to have English lessons instead of the planned activity. We were lucky everyone was safe. The students never returned to school. The agent moved all the students to Auckland. Their embassy was very helpful as the students never got their passports back.”
Penny O’Connell, International Student Director, Halswell School, Christchurch
Pastoral obligations
Institutional critical incident plans are primarily created with domestic students in mind. The assumption is made that parents and caregivers are immediately available to organise and manage arrangements around any critical incident involving their children. However, the majority of high school and tertiary international students are in New Zealand without parental support on hand so institutional critical incident plans need to recognise this gap. In addition, primary aged children will be here with an accompanying parent who may have little or no English or support networks.
Foster friendship networks with accompanying parents
“It is so important to have strong relationships with the parents accompanying your under 10-year-old international students. In many cases they are mothers, with little or no English language and no family support or established social networks when they arrive in New Zealand. They need to feel as valued as their children do from the start! Include them in your orientation programme and provide opportunities such as coffee catch ups to connect them with other international and where possible, domestic parents. Ensure that they(the parents), as well as their children/your students, know how to cope if they find themselves in an emergency situation while in New Zealand and what 24/7 support networks are in place within your school and community to help them.”
International Director, Primary School.
What functions and support roles do parents and caregivers of domestic students play in a critical incident?
Parents, caregivers and the wider community play a pivotal role in critical incidents supporting domestic students. Knowing the support functions that they play provides the opportunity to build a list of support needs (the gaps) that need to be covered when supporting international students through critical incidents. If one of your international students is involved in a critical incident then you will be responsible for carrying out all the support functions (scenario dependent) normally carried out by domestic parents and caregivers, in addition to those tasks specific to meeting international student needs. Such functions may include liaising with police, hospital, funeral directors, providing access to key institutional contacts and assisting with travel provisions for the overseas family to travel to New Zealand. When you know the range of potential tasks associated with critical incidents you can start building your essential critical incident contact list as part of your critical incident plan.
The table below sets out what some of those tasks might be.
2. Developing a tailored critical incident plan seems like a massive exercise – where do you start?
Creating a critical incident plan does not need to be a daunting exercise. There are a range of resources available which provide a wealth of information and the building blocks to meet your needs in developing a tailored critical incident plan. Your initial plan needs to be basic and comprehensive covering specific essential ‘must do’ items. It provides the foundation on which to build and incorporate contingencies representing the spectrum of critical incident scenarios.
Trusted, evidence-based resources include:
- Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice 2021
- Introduction to the ISANA NZ Critical Incident Kit
- Ministry of Education: Emergencies and traumatic incidents.
- NZQA Critical incident response plan – death of a learner
- National Emergency Management Agency: The 4 Rs and Get Ready
Let’s look at each of these in turn with respect to providing information around developing a tailored critical incident plan.
2.1 Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice 2021.
The Code provides the legal framework that education providers must meet for the wellbeing and safety of their international learners. When preparing your critical incident plan you need to ensure compliance with the relevant parts of the Code
2.2 ISANA NZ’s Critical Incident Kit
Creating a critical incident plan does not need to be a daunting exercise. There are a range of resources available which provide a wealth of information and the building blocks to meet your needs in developing a tailored critical incident plan. Your initial plan needs to be basic and comprehensive covering specific essential ‘must do’ items. It provides the foundation on which to build and incorporate contingencies representing the spectrum of critical incident scenarios.
Trusted, evidence-based resources include:
- Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice 2021
- Introduction to the ISANA NZ Critical Incident Kit
- Ministry of Education: Emergencies and traumatic incidents.
- NZQA Critical incident response plan – death of a learner
- National Emergency Management Agency: The 4 Rs and Get Ready
Let’s look at each of these in turn with respect to providing information around developing a tailored critical incident plan.
2.1 Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice 2021.
The Code provides the legal framework that education providers must meet for the wellbeing and safety of their international learners. When preparing your critical incident plan you need to ensure compliance with the relevant parts of the Code
2.2 ISANA NZ’s Critical Incident Kit
The introductory sections of the ISANA NZ Critical Incident Kit shares key critical incident information provided by experienced practitioners. Experienced grassroots practitioners understand that those working closely with international students will be the first people notified in the event of a critical incident. This is due to the trusted nature of their existing professional relationships with international students. The ISANA guidelines provide information around critical incident planning and the immediate, ongoing and follow up responses. It also covers components of practitioner health and wellbeing. It is a practitioner focused document recognising essential skills and attributes needed to deal with a critical incident and how to prepare yourself and other staff members for dealing with a critical incident in a cross-cultural setting. It recognises that self-care is a key principle in critical incident management.
2.3 Ministry of Education: Emergencies and traumatic incidents
The Ministry of Education’s Preparing for emergencies, traumatic incidents, evacuations and lockdowns provides an all-in-one fully comprehensive resource for schools to comply with health and safety regulations, recognising that emergency plans are mandatory for all schools. Critical incident policies, processes and procedures need to be coordinated so that in a time of crisis everyone is prepared and knows what to do. No-one knows when a critical incident may happen and these resources cover a range of scenarios to allow for international perspectives to be incorporated into institutional plans.
Templates and resources include:
- The Emergency Management Plan provides an editable template so you can create your own emergency plan to meet your institution’s needs.
- The Emergency Planning Guidance provides a practical guide to prepare for a range of critical incident emergencies . The fully comprehensive guide covers: planning; communication; re-uniting children/students with families; practice drills; emergency responses; civil defence emergencies; lockdowns and validating and testing your plan.
- The Emergency planning checklist is a must have to use when planning, preparing and reviewing your emergency plans.
- Emergency information for parents and caregivers – template provides a summary of key emergency management information that can be shared with your students’ parents and caregivers. Key information on communication management is provided which can be incorporated into your student and homestay contracts and used as part of your communication plan during and after a critical incident.
- Planning and preparation for a critical incident tends to focus on before and during emergency events. However, what comes after a critical incident is equally important. The Traumatic Incidents: Guidance for managing student and staff wellbeing recognises that whilst staff are best prepared to look after children during critical incidents it is important to put systems in place to support our students, academic and administrative staff and parents in the aftermath of a critical incident. Addressing the needs in the short term immediately following a critical incident avoids the long term potential of further harm.
2.4 NZQA Critical incident response plan – death of a learner
NZQA have provided three comprehensive resources for institutions to use in the event of death of a learner before, during and after a critical incident. It identifies the need to have a plan in place for learners to ensure that learners are protected, effects on the institution are minimised, day-to-day operations are restored and plans put in place to mitigate a recurrence of events. These include:
- Critical incident response plan – death of a learner
- Critical incident contact list – death of a learner
- Critical incident procedure flow chart – death of a learner
Let’s look at each in turn to see how they can help you from the international student perspective.
i. Critical incident response plan – death of a learner
- The Critical incident response plan provides a set of comprehensive operational templates to follow before, during and after a critical incident involving death of a learner. It identifies the need to have a plan in place for learners to ensure that learners are protected, effects on the institution are minimised, day-to-day operations are restored and plans put in place to mitigate a recurrence of events.
- Templates include the role of the Critical Incident Response Team, external agencies to contact and checklists for immediate, medium term and the long term.
The Critical Incident Response Team
The Critical incident response plan recognises the importance of being prepared prior to any critical incident and the role of the Critical Incident Response Team to provide immediate, ongoing and long-term support for those affected by the critical incident.
- The team is made up of key people including a pastoral care representative and the International Director to ensure that the needs of international students are represented.
- Everyone in the team has a designated role to play in the event of a critical incident.
- A contact list of Critical Incident Response Team members needs to be created and shared with key people throughout the institution in the event of a critical incident.
- The team should meet at intervals throughout the year to keep updated and review the institutions critical incident plan. This is also an opportunity to carry out scenario-based training in effective emergency response.
ii. Critical incident contact list – death of a learner
- The Critical incident contact list covers those ‘must-have’ contact details that are needed in any critical incident response. This includes the Critical Incident Response Team, Consulate/Embassies, NZ Police, various government departments, insurance, legal, counselling and New Zealand Immigration.
iii. Critical incident procedure flow chart – death of a learner
- The Critical incident procedure flow chart provides a comprehensive visual information/communication flow chart detailing the appropriate steps to take as and when necessary.
2.5 The 4 Rs and Get Ready – National Emergency Management Agency
The 4 Rs provides a New Zealand integrated approach to civil defence emergency management comprising: Reduction, Readiness and Response and Recovery
A breakdown of the 4Rs can be found here
Reduction
Reduction is focussed on reducing the likelihood of the risk and/or minimising the risk to an acceptable level. In this way it is about being proactive in looking after ourselves, our families and our work places to reduce the potential impacts of harm.
Readiness and Response
Our Readiness and Response recognises that our actions before, during and after a civil defence emergency can save lives and help communities recover.
Recovery
Recovery recognises that the ability to recover depends on how well we have prepared to recover. The process requires a coordinated holistic approach to bring about recovery in the immediate, medium and long term.
Get Ready provides information for you and your household to get ready and prepare for an emergency. Having created emergency plans for yourself at work it is equally important that you prepare yourself and your own family for an emergency. This will include ensuring that your homestay families have an emergency plan in place. Information provided includes making a household plan, a work plan and a school plan.
3. Putting your plan together
It is never too late to make a start on your critical incident plan
“Two things stood out to me prior to the 2011 earthquake. The first is that I had prepared a critical incident plan for our International Department which was specifically to meet possible needs for our sector and school. This was shared with the Principal and Board of Trustees the week before the earthquake. As part of the critical incident planning process I had attended an ISANA NZ PD Day on Critical Incidents. It was the best thing I could have done as it focussed my mind on what needed to be done. I went back to school and drafted our critical incident plan and updated my list of emergency contacts and had printed them out and had given back up copies to the Principal and our Pastoral Care support assistant. These were invaluable! Two days later we had the earthquake and, although we were in survival mode, we had a plan in place, which really helped us and our students. Over the next few weeks the support I received from the staff, Principal, Board of Trustees, parent community and the MOE International Department made a huge difference and helped save our International reputation long term. ”
Penny O’Connell, International Student Director, Halswell School, Christchurch
What are the essential ‘go to’s’ and the ‘must haves’ you need to have in your plan so you can manage a critical incident? Critical incidents take many shapes and forms. However, our critical incident plan shouldn’t be complex. Instead, you need to keep things simple so that, in the midst of a critical incident, what needs to get done, gets done. No matter what the critical incident there are a few key things you can have in place to be prepared to meet any critical incident. Let us look at the essential learnings from our critical incident resources above to develop a tailored critical incident plan comprising:
A Readiness – preparation and planning
B Reduction – risk analysis
C Response – immediate response
D Recovery – ongoing response
3.1 Readiness – preparation and planning
The proverb “You reap what you sow” is highly relevant in the critical incident planning context as the more that can be planned ahead, the better prepared you will be when a critical incident presents itself. No matter what the critical incident is, there are a few key things that need to be in place in order to be prepared. Our resources share some common objectives around critical incident planning; this information can inform how we can include our international critical incident plan into the wider institutional critical incident plan. Using the Ministry of Education’s Preparing for emergencies, traumatic incidents, evacuations and lockdowns as the principle source of information, our planning process includes:
Establishment of a Critical Incident Management Team (CIMT) who will be responsible for planning, leading, delegating, responding and managing institutional recovery to the critical incident. The International Director will represent the needs of international students on the CIMT. Functions of the CIMT include:
- All team members need to understand the parameters of their roles and their responsibilities in a critical incident.
- Preparation of essential contact lists including Police, Civil Defence, Embassies, High Commissions, Consulates, student associations, funeral directors, doctors, dentists, health specialists, local and regional councils and local cultural groups.
- Regular training will ensure that CIMT team members understand their roles, will have undertaken emergency drills and practised various critical incident scenarios.
The institution puts systems in place to respond and be ready to respond to events. International student needs are recognised and include:
- Accommodation – lockdown, evacuation, temporary shelter, relocation, homestay, handover of care for under 18 year international students.
- Back-up information systems in more than one place in case of physical damage to institutional location.
- Emergency response warning systems to alert staff, students and parents if the institution is placed in lockdown or evacuation is in place.
- First aid responders, training, first aid equipment. Includes first aid training for international student support staff.
- Reunification of students with parents, caregivers and homestay families after a critical incident.
- Storage of key information. Keep paper-based student contact information on hand at all times.
- Emergency packs containing essentials such as radio, torch, candles, matches, first aid kits, food and water placed in strategic locations around the institution including the International Department. Ensure that homestay hosts have emergency packs in their households.
Put operational institutional processes and procedures in place:
- Communicate processes and procedures to emergency services, staff, students, parents, caregivers, homestay hosts and student associations.
- Ensure that students receive a well organised and easily understandable orientation around critical incidents. Consider the use of first language advisors to provide emergency information in first languages.
- Provide training, scenario role playing, practice drills and warning systems to international students and homestay families.
- Ensure that international students have emergency and important contact information and a photo of their passport and other ID saved onto their mobile phone.
Have a timely comprehensible Communication Strategy incorporating:
- Communication protocols around who, when and how to communicate information during and after a critical incident with emergency services, staff, students, homestay families and parents.
- Communication trees incorporating international department and institutional-wide specific contact numbers.
- Preferred communication channels to use dependent on specific information for students, parents and homestay families, e.g. social media, text, phone, email, newsletter.
- Mobile phone strategy regarding students responding to institution’s texts and phone calls and having mobile phones with them at all times.
- How to share accurate timely information to overcome misinformation being sent out by students through social media.
- Privacy protocols when sharing information with media, students, staff and external stakeholders.
Recovery and wellbeing
- Recovery and wellbeing procedures to support students, staff and homestay families after a critical incident.
Reviewing the plan – repetition makes perfect:
- Peer review the effectiveness of your international critical incident plan and procedures with key stakeholders within your institution. How does it fit?
- Share your plan with an international practitioner from another institution for feedback and incorporate meaningful feedback into your plan.
- Your international critical incident plan is an evolving document. Ensure that critical incident plans are reviewed annually in line with your Code attestation and after any critical incident to meet your international students’ needs before, during and after a critical incident.
No plan is perfect – be prepared for the unexpected
Sometimes, despite the best of intentions, we can’t envisage every eventuality that may happen in a critical incident. Be open to the fact that things will happen that you haven’t prepared for and use the experience as a learning opportunity when reviewing your critical incident plans after the critical incident.
“Our emergency plan set out that, in the event of a major earthquake, International Students remain with their class and follow our emergency drill and meet at our designated areas outside. We went to our assembly area on the grass but it had started liquefying so, in the midst of all the chaos, we had to find another safe spot within the school grounds to ensure that everyone was accounted for and wait hopefully for parents/caregivers to arrive. A charged phone with International parent contacts loaded into it was vital. Our staff cultural advisors were able to help with essential translations of urgent messages being sent out while phone coverage was available.”
Penny O’Connell, International Student Director, Halswell School, Christchurch
“Our English Language school is a two-storey building and prior to the Christchurch earthquake the staffroom was located upstairs. After the earthquake, although the school was deemed safe, it was decided not to use the upstairs rooms. This was due to the fact that we were experiencing a multitude of aftershocks which were felt more severely upstairs. We now have our bags and personal possessions with us at all times, so we have access to our phones and paper copies of class and student contact information lists in case of emergency”.
Director, English Language School, Christchurch.
3.2 Reduction – risk analysis
Sometimes when we look at risks factors we overlook the obvious, the things we take for granted – like having a phone with us at all times
“Following the Christchurch earthquake we had to make changes to our Mobile Phone Policy for students. Previously we had a ‘no phone’ rule in classrooms but when students returned to school for the first time after the earthquake they were allowed them. We have since returned to the no phone policy in classrooms, but students will have them in their pockets or bags. We spend time at orientation reinforcing the message that students must have money on their phone and answer the phone immediately if the school is calling or texting. We tell students that we will phone them only if it is an emergency. This worked on the day of the Mosque shooting when we had to contact all our international students to ensure they were safe during the three hours lockdown.”
International Director, High School, Christchurch.
A component of critical incident preparation is the Reduction phase. What risks can we identify to eliminate or mitigate the impact or likelihood associated with incidents occurring? A key risk factor for international students is comprehension of critical incident information and messages. Contact Points – Enabling international students during critical incidents provides information on how to deliver key critical incident messages in an understandable and accessible way which can be easily shared by international students through their networks. Key risks for you to consider include:
- The diversity of country, culture, lived experience and social media preferences in your international student population.
- Critical incident information not provided in an easily understood way at your student orientation.
- International students having to deal with a critical incident in our country without having an understanding of this country’s context and life experience. We cannot assume they have life experience to manage themselves in a critical incident.
- International students use search engines from their home countries to find critical incident information from their home country which is not relevant in this country.
- The need to change the perceptions of international students who believe that they don’t need to know the information you provide as a critical incident won’t happen to them.
3.3 Response – immediate response
“Following the earthquake we stayed in our International Department as it was free of damage and a safe place for students and staff to shelter. We had been in contact with our own families and knew that they were safe and that they had things under control on the home front. We had to stay at school with all our international students until such time that they had all been collected by their families or homestay parents. We knew it could take hours for them to reach us and we were so grateful that we had water, an emergency food supply and blankets to keep us going until all our international students had been collected.”
International Director, High School, Christchurch.
Our initial response to a critical incident can save lives. The MoE’s Brief Overview for Incident Management Teams – First 24 hours in Traumatic Incidents: Guidance for managing student and staff wellbeing provides an easy to follow flowchart around institution-wide procedures to be followed as soon as a critical incident has been identified. Procedures in both NZQA’S Critical incident procedure flow chart and the introduction to the ISANA NZ Critical Incident Kit provide actions to be considered to meet international student needs in any immediate response:
- The Critical Incident Management Team (CIMT) will meet to plan the immediate response and protocols to follow after the critical incident has been verified. The International Director/Manager will assist with verification of the international student’s status and next of kin.
- Irrespective of the critical incident the student’s family needs to be contacted regarding the student’s circumstances. If a student has died as a result of the critical incident then you need to wait until the student’s family have been notified by Police before making contact.
- After the family have been notified you will be in a position to contact and liaise with the student’s education agent, health insurer, embassy staff, spiritual leader, teachers and Immigration New Zealand.
- Allocate individual roles and responsibilities to those within the International Department so that you can spread the load. This could include dealing with student enquiries, liaising with hospital staff or the funeral director. As students may be traumatised, arrange first language assistance as and when needed.
- Be aware of students and staff who may be affected by the incident and who may need additional support and refer them to counselling services.
- The CIMT, possibly in conjunction with the Police, will decide the timing and content of information to be shared with the student’s parents, school community and media. The aim is to reassure them that your institution is managing the situation and further updates will be available as and when available. In the first instance communications need to inform, clarify and not cause confusion.
- Meet to debrief with your international team at the end of the first day to evaluate the situation, put systems in place and plan for the next day and beyond. Ensure that notes are kept and report back to the CIMT.
3.4 Recovery – ongoing response
The recovery phase after a critical incident involves a coordinated approach in meeting ongoing needs to restore everything to normal. It is a period of repair, bringing closure, renewal and moving forward. While the CIMT will still meet to determine the overall ongoing response to any critical incident, the day-to-day ongoing response will lie predominantly with you and the International Department. Response and recovery plans in NZQA’s Critical incident response plan and the MoE’s Traumatic Incidents: Guidance for managing student and staff wellbeing provide templates and actions to be considered in any ongoing and recovery plan:
Short to medium term ongoing response:
- You need to delegate day-to-day tasks/decisions if you are going to be off-campus or otherwise engaged overseeing the critical incident. Unless it is a major critical incident the day-to-day functions of the International Department will need to continue as usual.
- Initially your days will be filled with ongoing liaison with police, medical staff, hospital, Embassy staff, funeral directors and your student’s health insurer.
- If your international student’s family are going to visit, you may be involved assisting them with travel and accommodation arrangements, liaising with INZ for visas and making an itinerary of people for them to meet upon arrival in New Zealand.
- Students may wish to be repatriated to their home country or elsewhere in the country if your institution can no longer offer tuition. Fee refunds will be aligned to this process.
- Following the death of a student you may find yourself responsible for repatriation of the student’s body back to their home country. This will involve you working closely with the funeral director, insurance company, Embassy staff and parents to meet the parent’s wishes.
- Throughout the immediate aftermath be aware of students and staff who are not coping and need help referring them to appropriate counselling services, Victim Support and other community-based support services.
- Students who have been victims of abuse, wrong-doing or in accidents may need legal and financial assistance together with advocacy.
- Ensure that in the midst of all the ‘busyness’ and being in ‘survival mode’ you find time to carry out debriefing sessions with those staff and students directly affected by the critical incident to build a picture of what happened, what can be learnt from the situation and review your critical incident plan accordingly.
- Keep a running record each day of what you are doing which you can refer to when writing reports after the critical incident.
Long term recovery – student and staff wellbeing
When an international student is involved in a critical incident or there is a natural disaster then you and other staff members are directly affected on several levels. This includes coping with the immediate crisis affecting your students and institution, caring for your families, looking after the ongoing remedial work in tying up loose ends, supporting everyone and carrying out your everyday role. Being in a ‘crisis’ state during and after a critical incident has health implications for you and other staff members. It is therefore important to have health and wellbeing systems in place to aid recovery and to reduce the long-term potential of emotional and psychological side effects.
Things to consider are:
- If you or staff members are struggling then EAP and Victim Support services are there for you to help you through the emotional and psychological effects following a critical incident.
- You and international student support staff need to be aware of managing your professional boundaries. As caring individuals we tend to put others' needs before our own.
- Aim to return to normal school routines and activities as soon as possible. Familiar routines in the school environment provide comfort and reassurance to those undergoing stress, trauma and grief.
- Understand religious and ethnic differences. Recognise that diverse cultures express grief in different ways. Have first language advisors available to talk to students. A useful guide is the New Zealand Police’s A practical reference to religious diversity (2012).
- Keep an open-door policy so that students can come and see you or other staff members as and when they need to talk in the days, weeks or months after a critical incident. You never know when an event may trigger an adverse response in a student or staff member.
- As you and other staff members will be directly impacted by the critical incident, meet together as a team to discuss what coping strategies you, as a team, and individually can do to take care and look after yourselves. This is an opportunity to share, be open, trust, be kind, support and look out for each other.
- Negotiate recovery time in lieu with your institution to recognise you and staff members who have been available 24/7 for days on end during a critical incident
4. The one-stop tailored critical incident plan
There are many different kinds of critical incidents. How do you ensure we cover all the different scenarios in our tailored critical incident plan?
Remember a critical incident is defined as:
‘A tragic or traumatic event or situation affecting a student/students which has the potential to cause unusually strong emotional reactions in the school/campus community.'
ISANA
Critical incidents can take many forms ranging from accidents, rape, assault, injury, murder, suicide, bullying, natural disasters and death to name but a few. As no two critical incidents are the same - how can a single critical incident plan cover all the required scenarios? The answer is to include examples of different critical incident case studies as exemplars of best practice to follow. Our case studies provide examples of different scenarios, solutions of what to do and can be used in role playing critical incident training and be attached to your critical incident plan as appendices.
5. Putting your plan into practice
You have a critical incident plan but how will you know what to do if you have never experienced a critical incident before?
Learning from experience provides essential learning opportunities in developing a tailored critical incident plan. You can’t be expected to know everything around what to do in a critical incident - what works and what doesn’t, what to focus on and what to set aside until later. That is where practitioner experience is key in knowing the essential tools you need to have on hand to manage a critical incident, irrespective of the critical incident.
Practitioners share tips on the realities of experiencing a critical incident
In any natural disaster ensure that you, your family and team members are safe in the first instance. The Critical Incident Management Team (CIMT) has overall responsibility and will commence the critical incident process dependent on team members who are safe at the time
Keep cash available to buy food and petrol as EFTPOS may be down due to disruption of the electrical network.
Start a new notebook and record everything to do with the critical incident in the notebook, this is your running record of contacts, meetings and essential information
Electricity and mobile phones may be out of use during a natural disaster – always carry, or store at a separate location, a paper-based copy of students’ names, addresses, homestays, agents and parents, should information be inaccessible electronically. Multi-campus institutions ensure that information is shared across campuses
Ensure that homestays understand that they are responsible for their homestay students during a natural disaster. This will mean they communicate directly with the student’s parents should the school be unable to communicate themselves. Homestay hosts must have contact details of the student's parents in case of emergency.
Encourage your students to participate in club-based activities and volunteering in the community. This keeps them engaged, feel needed and provides a focus on helping others rather than dwelling on the critical incident
6. Supplementary critical incident policy template
ISANA NZ produced the Critical Incident Policy template to assist international education practitioners. It includes a disclaimer that it is not to be used on its own as a best practice standard, and is only to be used as a supplement for institutions’ pre-existing critical incident policies. The policy template reflects the cumulative experience of frontline practitioners dealing with critical incidents that have impacted international students.
7. Summary of topic
A critical incident describes any out of the ordinary event which can result in loss or threat to life. In the event of a critical incident in New Zealand, most New Zealand students have their parents or family providing support throughout the critical incident process. International students, however, are here in New Zealand without immediate parental support. This topic ‘Develop a tailored critical incident plan’ explored how we fill the gaps in our domestic-oriented critical incident plans to cover the needs of international students. This includes managing and supporting our international students onshore, their parents offshore and our own families and staff as we work through the critical incident process. A key component to developing a tailored critical incident plan is learning from international student practitioners who have experienced critical incidents. Their shared experiences provide a foundation of knowledge on which we can prepare and build our tailored critical incident plans.
8. Acknowledgements
Learning from the voices of experience played an important role in this topic. I would like to thank the following people for their contribution and dedication in caring for and supporting our international students – Sylvia Hooker, Karen Kemsley, Lisa Lamar, Penny O’Connell, Louise Silvester, Lee Simeon, Colleen Steyn and respondents to ISANA NZ’s ‘Critical Incident Management Questionnaire’.
9. References and resources
Beard, Chris (2020), ‘Introducing the CI model for intercultural contact’, Transitions: Journal of Transient Migration, 4:2, pp. 235–247, doi: https://doi. org/10.1386/tjtm_00024_1
Gomes, C., Chang, S., Guy, M., Patrao, F., & He, S., Contact Points: Enabling international students during critical incidents. Retrieved from http://www.isana.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/pressed-quality-spread-v4.pdf
ISANA NZ. (n.d.) Critical Incident Kit. pp5-8
Ministry of Education. (2016). Traumatic Incidents: Managing Student and Staff Wellbeing, a Guide for School Crisis Management Teams March 2016. Retrieved from https://assets.education.govt.nz/public/Documents/School/Traumatic-incidents-and-emergencies/Traumatic-incidents-schools-Guidelines-for-wellbeing.pdf
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