American Federation of Teachers Offering Additional Short-Term Benefit: COVID-19 Grief Counseling

(via Lorretta Johnson, AFT Secretary-Treasurer)

As you know, on April 1 AFT launched a new member benefit – Trauma Counseling.

As we were working on our outreach on this new program, we heard from a number of leaders that our members and their families are feeling the trauma of not being able to be with their loved ones in their last moments. And then, due to quarantine, they are not able to say goodbye in the way that so many of us are used to with a funeral, service or memorial. They are grieving the death of their loved one, and the lack of closure and absence of peace that can come with that closure.

Thus, we are also making available an abbreviated version of the trauma counseling program – a Grief Counseling specifically for COVID-19 Deaths.

• This benefit is for an AFT member or retired member who has lost an immediate family member to COVID19, or for the immediate family member of an AFT member who has died from COVID-19.

• The program will run for three months and we may possibly extend it another month or two after.

• The program provides an assessment and two hours of grief counseling from Masters Level therapists.

• The program can be reached here.

I encourage you to share this information with your members as you learn of a death within our union family – either the death of a member or the member’s immediate family. (Immediate family is defined as spouse/partner, children, siblings, parents, grandparents).

Please contact aftplus@aft.org if you have any questions about this program or want more information on the trauma program.

Be safe. Stay healthy.