In a land where trauma has often defined everyday existence, a new project is taking shape and bringing hope and healing to survivors. The Global HOPE Training Initiative—HOPE stands for Healing Opportunities through Purposeful Engagement—calls upon the expertise of Chicago School faculty to train teachers strategies and skills that can be used in the assessment, prevention, and treatment of trauma.

The small African nation of Rwanda—which continues to struggle with the aftermath of the 1994 genocide that took more than a million lives and left a trail of destruction and human tragedy—is the first to benefit from the curriculum designed as a train-the-trainer initiative for trauma survivors. But it won’t be the last.

“We want to take the curriculum and apply it in other countries where there has been war, or natural disaster, or other tragedy,” said Tiffany Masson, assitant professor of forensic psychology. Dr. Masson and Dr. Mark Kassel, associate director of curriculum and instructional design, are spearheading the development of the curriculum, which they delivered for the first time in November 2009 to a group of 24 Rwandan teachers and psychologists.

“I felt so privileged to be there and that they (Rwandans) would trust me with their stories and share honestly about their struggles,” Dr. Masson said. “I feel I have a duty, now that I know what their needs are, to help them.”

One difference in societal perceptions stood out during her stay in Rwanda, she says. Whenever participants talked about trauma, they framed it in terms of genocide. They had never considered domestic violence, child abuse, and children orphaned by AIDS deaths—all present in Rwanda—as traumatic.

“It wasn’t until the fourth day they could say, ‘Yes, we do have a problem with those things’,” said Dr. Kassel. Similarly, Rwandan school teachers had not connected their students’ wild or withdrawn behavior to stress caused by abuse or violence and its aftermath. “They thought the kids were just misbehaving. Now they understand the kids’ acting out is very often a symptom of trauma,” Dr. Kassel explained.

The training initiative reflects The Chicago School’s vision of extending the healing effects of psychology around the world, especially to nations that have had little access to mental health knowledge or care. The vision is grounded in an intent to assist people in realizing their full potential and in a desire to lay groundwork for future peaceful relationships.

Drs. Masson and Kassel are using feedback gathered from the initial training project to refine the trauma curriculum. Their goal is to enable R wandan school teachers and orphanage workers to use the mental health skills they learn in the workshops to help students process trauma-related emotions and experience more peace in their lives.

The plan also calls for the 24 Rwandans who participated in the workshop, now called the Rwanda advisory board, to impart the curriculum content to school teachers and orphanage personnel throughout Rwanda in a trainthe- trainer model. TCSPP hopes to replicate that model in countries around the world, and is currently in discussions with representatives in China, Brazil, and Peru about potential project expansion.