Abstract
Law students are distressed, student well-being services are overwhelmed, and the need for higher education academics and professional staff to access trauma-informed training and tools has never been more urgent. This chapter reproduces with permission the trauma-informed matrix, which was developed as an easy-reference guide to improve trauma-informed teaching practices. The matrix combines 5 trauma-informed principles (safety; trustworthiness and transparency; collaboration, mutuality and peer support; empowerment, voice and choice; and cultural safety) and 3 elements of teaching and learning (course design, teaching, and assessment), to yield 15 intersections or cells. Academic and professional staff in positions of associate deans (learning and teaching), discipline leads, programme coordinators, course coordinators, lecturers, tutors, and learning designers (and equivalent positions) may apply the matrix to map trauma-informed practices in a new or existing course, programme, discipline, school, or faculty. This chapter describes how a case study approach was used to apply the trauma-informed matrix to a compulsory first-year law course with substantial sensitive content, and thus a risk of distress or vicarious trauma to students. Consequently, many examples of trauma-informed teaching practices were identified. The areas of strength included safety in course design and teaching; trustworthiness and transparency in course design and assessment; and empowerment, voice and choice in teaching. The areas in the law course that could be strengthened included collaboration, mutuality and peer support in assessment, as well as cultural safety across all three elements of teaching and learning. Further, the case study illuminated some learnings about the utility of the matrix that will assist in its future application.