The Jewish Community Critical Incident Response Team (JCCIRT) provides critical incident stress defusings and debriefings to small groups affected by a crisis or major occurrence, including community disasters, natural disasters, riots, robberies, vandalism, sudden deaths, and threats or acts of violence. Examples of incidents to which team members have responded include:

• sudden death of an organization’s staff member
• tragedy at a local school
• evacuations due to bomb threats
• threats of violence against a school

JCCIRT members are professionally trained and certified by the International Critical Incident Stress Foundation, Inc. to provide Critical Incident Stress Management for adults, adolescents, and children. Shortly after an incident occurs, team members can be dispatched to begin the process with groups of individuals who may have been traumatized by an event. They are not first responders, but rather their purpose is to allow people to process what occurred, provide education about stress responses, and offer information and referral to additional community resources, as needed.

Made up of more than 25 professionals representing agencies across The Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore System, the Team will focus on the greater Baltimore Jewish community, but may also serve others in the broader community as well.

The JCCIRT is coordinated by Jewish Community Services.