November 6, 2020

The 2016 election results shocked the nation and caused a national collective trauma, which has been exacerbated this year by COVID-19, protests against racism, and a tightly contested election. Collective trauma is insidious. Its impact affects all aspects of society.

Collective trauma is, by definition, marked by intense polarization, which causes a profound demonization of the other, making discourse about important political issues seem futile. Collective trauma manifests in labeling, blaming and shaming the “other,” harassment, and even violence against opponents. This leads to the inability to listen to the other. Our breakdown of civility has reached even the halls of Congress.

As a result of this collective trauma,  many have cut ties with their loved ones in the name of political differences. Social media, touted to be a unifier, has instead facilitated anonymous incivility, boorishness, and vitriolic hatred, compromising a basic unity Americans previously felt. Collective trauma leads to mistrust, which fuels conspiracy theories. Fake news proliferates, tainting reasonable discourse. If allowed to continue unabated, it will  destroy the very fabric of a free, democratic country.

Just witness the vitriol as Americans waited, with bated breath, for the election results. Half of the country is deemed irremediable and malevolent, the other half treacherous, and most institutions diminished.

The voice of collective trauma is amplified by the media, which has become so polarized it creates opposing and mutually negating narratives. Those stories are completely mistrusted by one side and blindly believed by the other.  The polarized media fosters the belief that the nation is doomed if the other wins, provoking a decision to break all the rules because the ends justify the means. Collective trauma undermines the hope for common ground.

Deeply emotional social issues, such as the composition of the Supreme Court, abortion, gun control, gay and transgender rights, racism, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech have become incendiary political bombs that ignite collective fear instead of needed dialogue and compromise.

To successfully address these issues and quell partisanship, we must acknowledge that we are trapped in collective trauma and commit to release it. We can recognize that we are traumatized if we scorn and hate our opponents. We are traumatized if we obsess over extremists and label them as dangerous enemies, if we can’t see good in the other, if we lose our compassion, and if we believe they deserve to be punished and hurt.

We must acknowledge that we are trapped in collective trauma and commit to release it.

We can recognize where we are through this description: Do you believe “the other” is ignorant, crude and uncaring, rigid, immoral, hawkish, bigoted, radical, extreme, dangerous, and malevolent? That “the other” is hypocritical, dangerous, self-righteous, and unpatriotic? Regardless of your political orientation, it is easy to fall prey to this partisanship.

What can reunify us right now, immediately?

A landslide by either party would have validated the winning party’s belief in the truth of their narrative. However, what currently appears to be a narrow victory shows us that neither side holds a mandate and demonstrates the need for acknowledging the other. This is the opportunity to reunify the country and return to bipartisanship and balance. Unity will be based on moderation and collaboration through a democratic political process.

It is possible to unite these two legitimate narratives once we take away the traumatic layers. When we work on our stressed nervous system and help release our layers of activation, we will regain our balance. With a balanced nervous system, we lose the excess energy held in our body and the polarization it provokes.

COVID-19 spurred a tremendous response from the mental health field. Thousands of therapists delivered the tools that can help us through this unusual crisis. We have many options for discharging the stress and trauma from our bodies.

A self-regulated nervous system will naturally move us towards more moderate stances and reasonable discourse. We can engage in dialogue to manage differences, as we have done for so many centuries. We can  create worthy goals of compassionate care for the downtrodden and mobilize an economy that can serve as a locomotive for the rest of the world. We will recover our reputation as one of the healthiest democracies in the world and the envy of nations. Americans have recovered from serious obstacles before, and we can do it again.

By addressing collective trauma and reaching unity, we can overcome the obstacles facing us. There is a keen awareness now that we need to end the pandemic, curb Iran’s nuclear and hegemonic ambitions, confront China’s economic and military growing power, end jihadism, repair the world economy, address climate change, and reckon with the impact of racism.

Let’s use this post-election period to do our individual part to confront our trauma and rein in our polarization.

Gina Ross, MFCT, is Founder/President of the International Trauma-Healing Institute in the US (ITI-US) and its Israeli branch (ITI-Israel) and author of  “Beyond the Trauma Vortex into the Healing Vortex.” Look at her institute’s EmotionAid for free, easy-to-learn stress release tools that can be used on the spot, anywhere, anytime.

For years to come, 2020 will be remembered as a time that changed everything. These months in quarantine have changed the way we interact with others, engage in our professions and relate to our family, friends and community. Nothing has gone untouched by the new reality.

The Jewish community, and Jewish education specifically, is not, and will not, be immune from the changes taking place. In fact, many of the changes are happening so quickly that most of us in the field have been too busy to take the time necessary to evaluate the changes and their long-term effects on the way we perceive education, how we educate, where we educate and, most importantly, why we educate.

In many of our Jewish schools, we’ve transitioned to either remote (Zoom) teaching or small, insulated pods with very little diversification or collaboration. We’ve moved away from extracurricular programs that promote social and emotional growth, connection and cultural awareness to remote or socially-distanced events that lack the same levels of connectivity and bonding opportunities. These are just a few of the changes we are seeing in the field of education.

These sweeping changes are forcing education to move into a realm that most educators have resisted for over 20 years. Personally, I have been pushing for a move to a more student-focused direction for over ten years, and I believe that we can offer our students so much more by shifting to online and blended learning, not just remote learning. I also firmly believe that we can offer our students so much more by giving them more ownership of their learning and learning outcomes. Here are some of the things we’ve already learned from the shift to online learning:

Moving a traditional classroom onto a remote (Zoom) platform does not work. Although this was a good, quick fix for the shutdown, Zoom and similar platforms are not appropriate for long-term online learning. Students, for the most part, are disengaged while attending remote classes: Most students struggle with maintaining their attention and are not actively engaged throughout the class. Although the use of cameras and microphones have been hotly debated because of issues with equity and self-estee​m, a study conducted through the Department of Education in​ April 2020, found that approximately 40% of students turn on their cameras and only five percent actively use their microphones. In some cases, students have become so tech savvy that they create a short video of themselves seemingly engaged and loop it so that it looks like they are fully participating even when they’ve stepped away from their computers.

Honestly, the issue with remote education is the use of cameras and microphones. Teachers may not actually know what to do differently to engage their students or ensure they are following the lesson. They are using the same in-person classroom management techniques in a remote environment instead of adapting their teaching styles to the remote environment. They don’t know how to use exit tickets, choice boards, Google Forms, chat boards, or flipped classes to even begin to assess how much their students are learning. Of course, there are outliers who are adept at using the technology, while others resist it.

In the past, a gentle touch to a shoulder or pointing to the place in the text or simply asking a question was enough to re-engage a student. In our new reality, none of these tricks exist and teachers don’t know what to do. Nor should they. This is a brand new way of teaching that requires a whole new set of pedagogical skills. And the bigger, unspoken problem is that school administrators didn’t know how to provide the training (or retraining) that teachers, students and parents so desperately needed.

In the past, a gentle touch to a shoulder or pointing to the place in the text or simply asking a question was enough to re-engage a student.

The solution is simple but very difficult to implement. First, every school needs to create policies to boost family engagement. These policies need to be implemented across the entire system, integrated in all programs, and sustained, with resources and infrastructure available for all participants. Parents should be provided with opportunities to participate in decisions that focus on student learning, beyond participation in pre-planned events. These family engagement policies must become part of our school evaluation process, putting the focus on student achievement and the shared responsibility of all stakeholders. These policies allow teachers to stop blaming students for not being engaged and parents to stop blaming teachers for not engaging their students. Instead, each teacher partner evaluates what they could be doing differently to support their students’ growth and progress. When we stop blaming others and reflect on what we could be doing differently to support our students, they get the best support possible.

There’s just one problem. Every stakeholder in education — administrators, teachers, community leaders, parents and students — assumes that educators possess the requisite skills, knowledge, confidence and belief systems to successfully implement and sustain these policies. But we don’t. These capacities, like everything else, need to be taught, modeled, refined and evaluated on an ongoing basis. We all need some training. Without this training, our partnership efforts can fall flat and default to one-way communication.

These capacities can be taught, but they cannot be applied across the community. Each school needs to take the time to really, deeply reflect on their community and evaluate what their students need and build the training that makes the most sense for their stakeholders — especially their students. It also requires that each school evaluate the capacities of their teachers to fully embrace a partnership with their students’ parents. Building these capacities requires an understanding between schools and parents that they have equal responsibility in the success of their students. Paying (and collecting tuition) is not enough to ensure our students’ growth — especially now. We all need to take responsibility for what is happening, and not happening, in our classrooms and our homes, for the sake of our children and the future of our Jewish community. It is time for parents and community leaders to become active partners in the education experience and not merely consumers of whatever the school offers.

For parents, this partnership will require them to show more flexibility with administrators and teachers. It requires experiments in pedagogy, in using technologies and techniques (exit tickets, choice boards, Google Forms for assessments, chat boards, flipped classes, alternative class schedules) while we move away from didactic instruction, where the teacher lectures and the students just listen. It requires acknowledging that we are learning all the time and that mistakes are going to be made. But these mistakes are part of the learning process and will lead to a better learning environment for our children. It also means that administrators and teachers need to be transparent about their experiments, the data they’ve collected, the results the data yields, and where the learning will go. Most importantly, parents and students need to work together to bridge whatever gaps may exist while pedagogies are being tried and refined for the long-term sake of our students, our schools, and our Jewish community.

We may be stuck with COVID-19 for a while. Let’s use the time in quarantine to emerge with a stronger Jewish education system.

Rebecca Coen is a long-time educational leader, coach and consultant dedicated to advancing the field of education through reflective thinking and strategic planning.