(From top left) Bobby Lynch, Dr. Heather Quagliana, and Dr. David Quagliana, pose for a photograph with pastors, students, teachers, and parents from Manta after a trauma and disaster response training session.
Lee University’s Drs. David and Heather Quagliana, along with Lee alums Christy Wyatt and Kyle Mitchell, traveled to Ecuador to assist the Semisud Seminary in providing child trauma education, school curriculum, disaster response training, and theological and spiritual response education, along with many forms of direct intervention to locals.
After a series of serious earthquakes in April, the Ecuadorian government called on schools to provide trauma-based curriculum. Church of God missionaries Bobby and Tamitha Lynch contacted Heather Quagliana for advice about putting boxes together for traumatized children, starting a conversation which grew into planning a trip for Quagliana along with her husband and two recent Lee grads to visit the country themselves to conduct on-site training and to provide materials and direct disaster intervention.
“I experienced our trip to be a profoundly rewarding opportunity to practice some of the approaches to caregiving that I value most in both Christ’s example to Christians as well as psychological and educational theory,” said David Quagliana. “We were able to multiply the impact of the care we provided by educating rather than merely interacting.”
One of the first projects of the group was to work with the Holistic Child Development students at the Church of God’s Semisud Seminary. They trained 20 HCD students to provide both direct intervention and education for pastors, teachers, community leaders, parents, and children. In coming weeks, the HCD students will lead their own trainings and therapy sessions with more individuals and groups in need, including church leaders and school teachers.
“We came to offer hope and practical solutions to a people who were looking for answers, but God orchestrated it in a way none of us could've expected,” said Mr. Mitchell.
During the four-day trip, the team from Lee was also able to provide multiple training and disaster response manuals; donate seven suitcases of supplies; and teach spiritual, psychological, and developmental response material to local church and community leaders, schoolteachers and administrators, and parents.
“I could see God's hand working in everything our team did,” said Ms. Wyatt. “It was amazing to watch joy on the face of a child who was able to express her trauma for the first time through drawing, and relief on the face of a parent who was able to express their constant difficulties and realize they weren't alone.”
The team also provided direct intervention for around 500 children in school classrooms and Sunday School classes, consulted directly with specific individuals in need, and led four disaster and intervention debriefing sessions for approximately 100 attendees.
“On our last day in Ecuador, the pastor of the church we served shared with us that his family was desperately looking for ways to give hope to his church body,” continued Mr. Mitchell. “They asked to see the face of God, and he believes he saw God's face through us. What God revealed through us was simple, but it will forever impact us and the people we came in contact with.”
The concrete impact of this trip will last even beyond the intervention and support that will be provided by HCD students in the future. The Lee group brought and donated a 40-page “Disaster and Trauma Response for Pastors Handbook,” a Sunday school curriculum, and a six-week school curriculum for all school-aged children (3-16). The handbook and Sunday school curriculum were specifically created for this situation by members of the team. Through collaboration between the Lee group and nonprofit efforts coordinated by the Lynches, 2,000 trauma care packages were distributed. These consisted of toys, art supplies, basic self-care supplies, and more for children in the community, including a children’s story for earthquake response written by the National Child Traumatic Stress Network.
“Being able to train teachers and other community helpers to come alongside children in their suffering, validate their fragile emotions, and offer them play- and art-based coping tools has been one of the highlights of my career and ministry,” said Heather Quagliana. “With our amazing team combined with Bobby and Tamitha's Ecuadorian-based team, we have been able to provide trauma care that not only has immediate impact, but lasting impact due to our joint model of teaching coping skills and empowering teachers, parents, children, and pastors to carry on the work our teams began.”
Heather Quagliana is a tenured associate professor in the department of Behavioral and Social Sciences. She is an expert in childhood trauma and child/developmental intervention. David Quagliana is the director of the Lee University Counseling Center, a licensed psychologist, and an expert in trauma therapy, disaster response, and the integration of psychology and spirituality. Ms. Wyatt is an administrator at Lee’s Early Learning Center, a local children’s minister, and a graduate of Lee’s Holistic Child Development master’s program. Her master’s thesis was on the development of school curriculum in response to disaster experiences. Mr. Mitchell is a recent graduate of Lee’s undergraduate psychology program and Heather’s former teaching assistant.
For more information about Lee’s graduate programs in counseling, contact Beth Bulow, graduate admissions coordinator, at bbulow@leeuniversity.edu.
For more information about this team’s service, their collaboration partners in Ecuador, or to make a donation to help the affected children continue to pay school tuition, please visit http://lovegodserveothers.com/blog/donate/give-care.
Kyle Mitchell (right), along with an Ecuadorian HCD student, handing out trauma care packages to students at the school where the team served.