This workshop equips educators, mental health professionals, and youth-serving staff with the tools to recognize, validate, and respond to the complex grief experiences of Black and marginalized children. Drawing from The Cost of Healing in Silence: Navigating Racial Trauma and the Call for Culturally Responsive Care, participants will learn to integrate grief literacy and racial trauma awareness into their practice, develop culturally responsive strategies that affirm identity, and build classroom and community environments where young people are no longer left to grieve in silence, but supported in their healing.

*Please note: This webinar must be attended live. The recording will not be available following this webinar. 

Continuing Education (CE) Credits: 1.5 continuing education credits pending
Target Audience: Counselors, Social workers, Bereavement support professionals, school professionals
Instructional Level: Intermediate – This best describes a topic or issue that the audience likely has a theoretical foundation for understanding and/or a working knowledge
Format: Live Interactive Webinar

Cost: Free for NACG Members; $60 for Guests without CEs, $75 for Guests with CEs

Not currently a member? Become a NACG member today! Your membership will provide access to free monthly webinars with CEs on current topics to support you in your work, discounts on educational events, access to all webinar playbacks, and more. To learn more and become a member to access this webinar for no additional cost, visit HERE →

After attending this webinar, participants will be able to:

• Identify behavioral, emotional, and cultural indicators of grief in Black and marginalized youth that may be misinterpreted as defiance or disengagement.
• Analyze how racial trauma and systemic inequities intersect with childhood grief experiences and impact student learning and well-being.
• Apply culturally responsive grief literacy frameworks to classroom or community-based scenarios involving bereaved children.
• Develop strategies for creating supportive environments that validate cultural identity and reduce stigma around grief expression.
• Design at least one practical action step to engage families or community partners in supporting children through bereavement and racial trauma.

Speaker Bio:

Ashley McGirt, MSW, LICSW, is a licensed mental health therapist, author, and nationally recognized speaker whose work bridges clinical expertise with lived experience. As a Black woman who was exposed to grief and loss at an early age, she understands firsthand the deep impact bereavement has on children, particularly in communities that are historically marginalized and underserved.

Ashley has spent her career addressing the intersections of racial trauma, grief, and mental health, dedicating her work to eliminating barriers to care and building culturally responsive support systems. She is the founder and CEO of the Therapy Fund Foundation, a nonprofit committed to providing free therapy, scholarships, and resources that affirm the experiences of Black individuals and families.

Through her book, The Cost of Healing in Silence: Navigating Racial Trauma and the Call for Culturally Responsive Care Ashley amplifies the urgency of creating spaces where grief is not pathologized or silenced, but recognized and supported. She has led trainings and workshops across schools, health systems, and community organizations, equipping educators and practitioners with tools to better serve children navigating grief within the context of systemic inequities.

Grounded in both her professional practice and her personal story, Ashley brings a unique voice to conversations about loss, healing, and resilience. Her mission is to ensure that no child is left to grieve in silence, and that every family has access to care that honors both their pain and their cultural identity.

Supported by the philanthropic investment
of the New York Life Foundation.

Continuing Education (CE) Provider Information:

Each professional is responsible for the individual requirements as stipulated by their licensing agency. Please contact your individual licensing board/regulatory agency to review continuing education requirements for licensure renewal. Please note: You must attend “live” (in real-time) to earn CEs. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the CE process, please contact Megan Lopez at megan.lopez@childrengrieve.org or at (432) 288-4688.

The National Alliance for Children’s Grief has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 7221. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. The National Alliance for Children’s Grief is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs. Counselors completing this course will receive 1.5 contact hours.

The National Alliance for Children’s Grief is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Social Work as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed social workers #SW-0689. Social Workers completing this course will receive 1.5 contact hours.

The National Alliance for Children’s Grief is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed mental health counselors. #MHC-0238. Counselors completing this course will receive 1.5 contact hours.

National Alliance for Children’s Grief, #1819, is approved to offer social work continuing education by the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) Approved Continuing Education (ACE) program. Organizations, not individual courses, are approved as ACE providers.  State and provincial regulatory boards have the final authority to determine whether an individual course may be accepted for continuing education credit. National Alliance for Children’s Grief maintains responsibility for this course.  ACE provider approval period: 07/20/2023 – 07/20/2026. Counselors completing this course will receive 1.5 continuing education credits.

Refund/cancellation policy: If you need to cancel your registration, please contact Megan Lopez at megan.lopez@childrengrieve.org or at (432) 288-4688. Please note that no refunds will be given.

To request accessibility accommodations: The National Alliance for Children’s Grief is committed to providing universal access to all our events. Please contact Megan Lopez at megan.lopez@childrengrieve.org or at (432) 288-4688 to request disability accommodations. Advance notice is necessary to arrange for some accessibility needs.

Attendance policy: To earn CEs for this event, you must attend the entirety of the event as demonstrated by your autogenerated login and logout time on the Zoom Webinar report and complete an online event evaluation within seven (7) days of the event. Please make sure you are signed into Zoom using the name that matches your professional license and not the name of your place of employment, as there is no way to verify your attendance after the fact if your name does not appear on the Zoom Webinar report. CE certificates will be sent out within 30 days of the educational event. The link for your certificate will come from “certificates@simplecert.net” as the National Alliance for Children’s Grief. Please be sure to add this email to your “safe sender list”. The NACG is unable to process certificates after 90 days from the date of the event. 

CE Certificate retrieval request: The NACG maintains continuing education records for at least six years from the date of completion of the educational event which include: the name and curriculum vitae of the presenter, a record of attendance, an outline of the course, date, and location of the course, and the number of hours for completion of the course. If you attended a CE educational event and need a copy of your CE certificate, please complete this form to obtain a copy: https://nacg.wufoo.com/forms/qfsln7r1twqpty/. Please note if the education event was more than 90 days ago, and a required evaluation was not completed, a certificate cannot be provided per the policy.

Grievance policy:  To view the NACG’s Continuing Education Grievance Policy, you can find it HERE. Please complete THIS form to share a grievance with the NACG regarding a continuing education event.