U.P. Grief Support Training:

Theories and Tools Supporting Children and Youth

For professionals, educators, and caregivers

Enhance your grief support skills through expert guidance, interactive activities, and experiential practices for compassionate, personalized care.

Course Objectives
Participants will:

• Describe key concepts and types of loss and grief and summarize updated models of grieving and healing.
• Explain the Holistic Psychosocial Care Plan for grief support.
• Identify core grief support competencies, including effective communication, cultural humility and spiritual sensitivity
• Examine the cognitive, emotional, and physical grief responses based upon a client’s developmental age.
• Develop creative individual and group interventions for grieving children/adolescents
• Assess the risks and benefits of grief work and identify ways to care for yourself and others while doing this work (i.e. mindful breathing, movement techniques, etc.)

Agenda: Tentative

9:00–9:15 a.m. – Opening Mindfulness Practice
9:15–10:00 a.m. – Understanding Grief and the Spiral Grieving Process
10:00–11:00 a.m. – Holistic Care Plans and Competencies with Case Studies
11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – Tools for Healing and Support (mapping, breathing, movements, etc.)

12:00–12:30 p.m. – Lunch and Networking Break

12:30–1:00 p.m. –Developmental Perspectives through Cases and Interactive Art Activities
1:00–2:00 p.m. – Individual and Group Interventions for Grieving Children and Adolescents
2:00–2:30 p.m. – Risk Assessment and Self-Care
2:30–3:00 p.m. – Closing Mindfulness Practice, Integration, Evaluation

Presenters:

Dr. Yan Z. Ciupak

Yan Z. Ciupak, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Northern Michigan University and co-founder of the Grief Support Specialist Certificate Program, endorsed by the Association for Death Education and Counseling, the Department of Education, and other professional associations. Dr. Ciupak is recognized for her interdisciplinary, multicultural, and mindfulness-based approaches to teaching and scholarship. She has presented nationally and internationally, appeared on television and radio, and participated in dialogues such as the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Her most recent book, Death, Dying, and Grief: Theories, Tools, and Cases, was published in May 2025 by Springer Publishing Company.

Molly Tomony 

Molly Tomony MA, ATR-BC, LPC obtained her undergraduate and graduate degrees in Art Therapy. As a Registered, Board-Certified

Art Therapist and Licensed Professional Counselor, she has worked in hospitals, hospices, schools, and mental health clinics primarily with those who are coping with grief, loss, disabilities, transitions and trauma. She is also trained in Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. For the past ten years, she has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses on grief, trauma, development, crisis intervention, and self-care while working in a community practice with children, teens and adults.

Registration:

• Standard Registration: $25
• Registration with Nursing or Social Work Continuing Education Credits (6): $50
• Student Registration: $15

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