Urban Trauma® Certification
- Home
- Urban Trauma® Certification
Treat Racial Trauma Bring True Change to Our World
Do you have a vision for achieving racial justice?
How has racism affected your clients, students, community?
What tools can support their healing from racial trauma?
Be a change agent
Become Urban Trauma® Certified
Educators, first responders, counselors and caseworkers — learn how your students, community members or clients have been racially traumatized. Obtain the practical tools needed to support their healing. This is your CALL to ACTION.
Become certified in this work. Become a leader in breaking the cycle of racial trauma and injustice.
Measurable steps can help your clients see what being a healed, whole person looks like. Be a vessel to support the healing process.
Enroll in the Certified program to learn how to begin the work of healing urban trauma.
THE PROBLEM
HISTORICAL RACISM
The history of racism is crucial to gaining insight about Urban Trauma – multigenerational and chronic exposure to racialized trauma from the period of the enslavement of Africans to modern-day mass incarceration to implicit and unconscious bias. An essential aspect of antiracism work is learning about the lasting and detrimental psychological effects of racism.
BIOLOGY/ EPIGENETICS
Constant exposure to certain traumas over time becomes integrated in our genetic makeup. Epigenetics has identified a marker for traumatic stress in our DNA, generated by daily exposure to both subtle and explicit forms of racism. Inherited trauma, often passed down one generation after another, can cause devastating effects in physical and mental health.
TOXIC ENVIRONMENT
We are an extension of our environment. Nurture plays a vital role in our development, including how we handle our challenges and successes. Inequities in urban environments can make Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) more susceptible to developing urban trauma.
Urban Trauma Can Be:
- Multigenerational and ongoing.
- Heightened by traumatic stress and adverse childhood experiences (ACEs).
- Perpetuated by multiple forms of racism that have been supported by government, laws, institutions and people.
The Urban Trauma® Certified course has been developed by a Yale-trained psychologist, best-selling author, and healer, Dr. Maysa Akbar.
This framework does not require past education or experience in mental health. It was specifically created for all professionals, educators, nonprofit and faith leaders, law enforcement, corrections officers, child protective services, mental health and community service providers.
What racial traumas are people facing in today’s world?
- Prejudice: Perceptions of intellectual and mental inferiority of Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC)
- Housing Discrimination: BIPOC individuals are more likely to be the victims of redlining and poverty.
- Mass Incarceration: The school-to-prison pipeline is the disproportionate incarceration of minors and young adults from disadvantaged backgrounds, primarily BIPOC, due to harsh school and municipal policies.
- Fatalities: The number of deaths of BIPOC individuals at the hands of law enforcement is increasing.
Equipped as a Certified Urban Trauma® specialist, you can:
- Understand the work required to undo the damage caused by generations of trauma.
- Bring positive affirmations to your relationships.
- Support people’s efforts to overcome Urban Trauma and regain control of their lives.
- Empower them to move from surviving to thriving.
- Guide your clients as they learn greater emotional control and move beyond the burden of generational traumas.
What is included in the Urban Trauma® Certified course?
Enroll in the Certified program and receive access to 12 multimedia modules and a workbook to facilitate your learning with the best experience possible.
The workbook provides practical tools to evaluate your clients’ struggles and vulnerabilities and an opportunity for self-reflection.
The Urban Trauma® Certified program’s modules cover a broad range of topics and critical challenges.
You will also gain a lifetime benefit from:
The opportunity for self-reflection to explore your own identity and implicit biases.
A greater sense of commitment with clear applications to your community work anchored in racial justice.
The Urban Trauma® Certified program’s modules cover a broad range of topics and critical challenges.
MODULE 1
Overview
Urban Trauma® is not a diagnosis or a mental health issue. It is not present in everyone, nor is it self-inflicted. It is a deep-rooted psychological and genetic condition that is caused by racially motivated toxic stress in urban settings.
MODULE 2
History
Urban Trauma® unpacks the impact of centuries of chronic discrimination against Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) communities. To dismantle racism, we must understand its roots and how it is embedded in society.
MODULE 3
Anger
Constant exposure to certain trauma over time becomes integrated in our genetic makeup. Epigenetics has identified a marker for traumatic stress in our DNA. Inherited trauma is passed down from one generation to another and has a detrimental effect on both physical and mental health.
MODULE 4
Mistrust
MODULE 5
Assessments
MODULE 6
Anger
One of the rawest emotions, anger is even more pronounced for people of color. Whether consciously or subconsciously, the majority of those with urban trauma intimately identify with anger because there is profound pain associated with experiences of racism.
MODULE 7
Mistrust
Systemic racism does not foster positive nurturing attachments or relationships. For that reason, trust has been deeply broken for centuries and continues to be abused. So how can we expect those with urban trauma to develop trust in people, programs and systems that have caused extraordinary harm?
MODULE 8
Manipulation
MODULE 9
Fear
Fear is paralyzing, consumes our thinking, and stunts our growth. Fear does not allow for thoughtful planning and execution of self-empowerment.
MODULE 10
Perceptual Error
MODULE 11
Rejection
MODULE 12
Breaking the Cycle
We must become antiracist to dismantle systemic oppression. Understanding the different variations of racism allows us to break generational cycles and strive for a more equitable world. The goal of this program is to move those who have experienced urban trauma from a state of merely surviving toward a future of thriving.
“I am relentless in my pursuit of racial justice and mental health.
Dr. Maysa Akbar, PhD, ABPP
Early in her career, she recalls a pivotal moment: “I was sitting around a table, surrounded by people who did not look like me, who were trying to figure out how to help ‘these poor’ Black and Brown children. They spoke about our beautiful children as if they were defective and in dire need of salvation. They had no personal insight into how our children came to live in their neighborhoods, how their families struggled, or how their schools lacked the resources to provide them with a proper education.
“ I knew that structural racism was alive and well; I have often witnessed its path of destruction, both personally and professionally.
“ At that moment, I decided that I would not be a spectator watching others make decisions for our kids, our families, our community – so instead I stepped up and challenged the status quo.
“ I refused to passively sit by one more day, as folks carelessly labeled our children – disenfranchised, troubled, at risk, noncompliant. I committed to being a disruptor who would educate and inform others about racism’s role in the collective traumatic experiences of diverse people. I committed to deepening my healing work with individuals to being an agent of systemic change for communities of color.
“I have been able to slowly dismantle racism with the support of allies who funded my work, the accomplices who lifted the Urban Trauma® framework, and advocates who secured my seat at the table. For all these reasons, Urban Trauma® framework and the Allyship Identity Model were born.” Dr. Akbar is a board-certified clinical psychologist and an Assistant Clinical Professor at Yale University, School of Medicine. The CEO and founder of Integrated Wellness Group, a psychotherapy practice specializing in treating race-based trauma since 2008, Dr. Akbar also represents the American Psychological Association at the United Nations. Dr. Akbar lives in New Haven with her husband and two children. In her spare time, she engages in meditation and yoga practices focused on healing and liberation from race-based trauma.
When you're ready to put your URBAN TRAUMA® Training into action...
Urban Trauma® Fidelity capstone
Each call will serve as a virtual peer discussion and address how participants are applying their new knowledge to their work with clients and community members
Phone sessions will cover:
Introduction to the Urban Trauma® Work
How you prepared for your initial session with your client, what urban trauma symptoms you have identified, what techniques have proven helpful.
Forming
Elements of the training used in your session, what you could have done better, the healing goals established, client response to the interventions used.
Storming
Norming
Activity areas you feel less confident in as a Certified Urban Trauma® professional, plans to strengthen those areas, handling any regression or defensive client behavior, facing challenges, client progression toward healing goals, how you find conversations changing with people showing urban trauma characteristics.
Performing
Your progress to date as an Urban Trauma® Certified Professional, strengths and opportunities of using this type of racial justice method, skills you would like to improve, what approaches you are committed to trying with clients to help them heal.
Reflective Consultation
Client case studies since the beginning of your certification process, most helpful training elements, how you have incorporated your newfound knowledge in your work practice, how Urban Trauma® work has helped move you closer to your racial justice practice goal.
frequently asked questions
We recommend that you spend a few days on each module in order to absorb the information, reflect on your own role in historic systemic racism, and complete the homework assignments. With twelve modules, we estimate that it will take about five-six weeks. With the online format, you can learn at your own pace.
We have seen the impact this work can have in healing past traumas. Certification reflects your commitment to achieving professional growth and development goals and equips you to work with this vulnerable population.
Yes! You will have access to the entire program for one full year after you enroll. Review the materials at your convenience.
We encourage you to share your newfound knowledge with people you work with and others in your community. You also will be part of a learning community of other Urban Trauma practitioners who will be training along with you. But please be aware that your access to the membership site is only for you. The materials in the program are copyrighted by Dr. Maysa Akbar and are not available for duplication or distribution without her permission.
The Urban Trauma® Certified program and
URBAN TRAUMA® FIDELITY CAPSTONE
are not available anywhere else.
Enrollment in the Certified course with capstone program gives you access to:
- 12 multimedia modules with two to four lessons each, with a mix of videos, assignments and quizzes.
- A free copy of The Workbook for Professionals to facilitate your learning, with practical tools to evaluate your clients’ struggles and vulnerabilities and an opportunity for self-reflection.
- Participation in a peer-based Urban Trauma® Fidelity Group.
Register now to become Certified. Gain the knowledge to help your clients become healed, whole people.
Real Life Stories
Dr. Akbar has partnered with some of the world’s most powerful organizations in reenvisioning their commitment to antiracism and racial justice work.