About TrACE Aberystwyth

Aberystwyth University has committed to becoming a trauma-informed university. 

 

We are working in collaboration with ACE Hub Wales, a Wales-wide organisation funded by the Welsh Government to be able to work with organisations and people across Wales so that we become a natiAberystwyth Students chattingon that is trauma-informed  and understands the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs).  Aberystwyth is proud to be a part of this national movement, which has drawn global attention, in striving to become a sector leader as a trauma-informed university.

Aberystwyth is a place that students and staff choose to live and work for many reasons including wanting to feel safe, supported, connected and included. Aberystwyth can build into the compassionate, empathetic, kind environment we have, so that in everything that we are and do we recognise that anyone may experience adversity of trauma in their lives and at times we may need more support to overcome this. People will choose to live, study and work here and if we build a community that helps one another at times when we need more support to overcome the challenges in our lives.

ACE Hub Wales have created a short animation to capture the essence of what being trauma-informed means.

The TrACE Toolkit and Practice Framework

Everyone has a role to play in Wales becoming an ACE and trauma-informed nation. A ‘Trauma-informed’ approach is about understanding that lots of people have adversity and trauma that affects them in all kinds of ways. The TrACE toolkit has been developed by ACE Hub Wales in co-production with partners. It is a resource to support people, organisations, sectors and systems to develop their own ACE and trauma-informed approach. It focuses on building into (not onto) existing good practice and identifying where improvements and changes can be made to policies, practice, culture and environment. It is a key part of the Wales Trauma-informed Practice Framework  which sets out how people, communities, organisations, sectors and systems all working together, can create a society where far fewer people will need additional support because  people will be able to get help earlier and in the right way.

TrACE at Aberystwyth

Aberystwyth University is working with ACE Hub Wales to become a TrACE informed university. But what does that mean for us? The journey to becoming a TrACE organisation involves preparing as a community to take this step, looking at where we are now, what we already do that is taking a trauma-informed approach, and what else we need to consider to ensure that:

  • Everyone in the Aberystwyth University community understands what is meant by adversity and trauma-informed
  • Everyone can get the right support from our community (academic, students, volunteers and professionals) and services we might need at the university and beyond
  • Everyone’s life is better at the university because we are all working together across the community in the best ways to help us
  • Everyone has a role in making this work

Meet the Team

The work started by bringing together a group of people with expertise at the university to help us to think about what might be needed to take this forward. From there we recruited a project manager, Sara Childs, who is leading the work with the support and challenge of a newly established Steering Group. The group includes representation from across the university community, and can help to take forward the reflection and review exercise we are currently undertaking to assess where we are on the journey. The steering group is chaired by Ian Munton, Director of Student Services.

 Active members include:

Professor Jo Hamilton, Associate Dean for the Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences
Dr Gethin Rhys, Interim Academic Registrar
Kate wright/ James Woolley, Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit
Mary Keeler-Kenyon, Senior Residences Manager
Dylan Eurig Jones, Diversity and Inclusion Manager
Emily (Mo) Morgan, Undeb wellbeing Officer
Rosemary Shaw, Student Mental Health and Wellbeing Manager
Thomas Bates, Head of Facilities Management
We are also fortunate to be joined by Aber alumna and ACE Hub Wales lead, Dr Jo Hopkins
We also benefit from the expertise of our Advisory Expert Group, with members comprising of
Dr Martine Hopkins, Psychology
Dr Saffron Passam, Psychology
Georgina Gray, Psychology PhD student and founder of Traumaform
Dr Emma Sheppard, Sociology
Professor Andrea Hammel, Modern Languages
Lisa Kinsella, Nursing

 

 

 

What Are We Doing?

We have recently come to the end of the self-assessment phase, which reflected on and reviewed existing good practice as well as considering where we could do things differently to embed the foundational values and principles of trauma-informed practice at Aberystwyth. This is helping us to prepare for the action-planning phase so that we can launch our project delivery during academic year 2024-2025.

  

To gather information, we hold Community Conversations to co-create our Vision and Mission for this work using a roadmap approach to consider where we start, where we are going, how we are going to get there and our ambition in the style of a treasure map! These conversations focus on areas of the self-assessment that are critical to our understanding of where we are starting, such as communications and engagement, training, policies and practice, inclusion and culture.