The most prominent service NOVA provides is the NOVA Crisis Response Team Training™. The training provides caregivers with techniques to best deliver critical education and emotional first aid to victims, survivors and community members in the event of a mass-casualty or natural disaster.
A NOVA Crisis Response Team is a group of individuals specifically trained to provide trauma mitigation, education and emotional first aid in the aftermath of a critical incident, either small-scale or mass-casualty. NOVA CRT™ members each have a minimum of twenty-four hours of skill-based, field-tested training. Most teams have extensive training and experience in the widest range of traumatic events, from mass shootings to natural disasters.
Since 1986, NOVA has been involved in hundreds of both small-scale critical incidents as well as mass-casualty disasters. NOVA CRT™ services that have been requested include hurricanes, tornadoes, fires, mass shootings, and as large as the four sites of 9/11 all done in an effort to help stabilize members of their respective communities.
Crisis response is a key element of fulfilling NOVA’s mission to champion dignity and compassion for those harmed by crime and crisis. Trauma has common reactions but the cause of the trauma, from wide-area natural disasters to multiple victim crimes of violence, have different layers and dimensions. There are organizations that focus on crime victim advocacy and others that deal with disaster relief. NOVA is unique in that it incorporates extensive skill and experience in training a vast network of responders in a broad range of needs that stem from criminal, man-made and natural crisis victimization.
Since 1975, NOVA has provided many services to assist victims of crime and crisis in the United States. The most prominent service NOVA provides is its training for caregivers in the techniques of “community crisis response” and to deploy those trained professionals as volunteers, upon request, to communities impacted by a mass casualty or natural disaster. NOVA-trained Crisis Response Teams respond with critical education and emotional first aid for a community with the hope and expectation that should there be recurring incidents, the community will be better prepared to cope with the tragic psychological effects.
A Crisis Response Team is a group of individuals trained to provide trauma mitigation and education in the aftermath of a critical incident, either small-scale or mass-casualty, scaling the response to the need, from one individual to thousands (i.e., the “Walking Worried”).
NOVA CRT training participants have a minimum of twenty-four hours of skill-based, field-tested training. These teams could be state coordinated (e.g. out of a state attorney general’s office) or local teams (e.g., a school district). Most teams have extensive training and experience in the widest range of traumatic events, from shootings to natural disasters.
In over twenty-six years of providing crisis response training, service and management consultation, NOVA has trained over ten thousand people to provide basic crisis response services. While NOVA’s Basic Community Crisis Response Team training is twenty-four hours, there is an extended forty-hour program that some prefer. There is also an Advanced CRT program that is twenty-four hours. All official NOVA training has to be provided by a NOVA-approved trainer.
NOVA-trained responders represent a wide range of contexts and vocations. NOVA CRT training is used by tribal communities, mental health professionals, first responders, school counselors, human resource departments and victim advocates, just to name a few.
A more precise question is, how are NOVA-trained individuals deployed? With thousands of trained responders all over North America as well as other parts of the world, NOVA-trained crisis responders are likely present in many mass-casualty crises around the nation. NOVA-trained responders are commonly involved in one of three ways:
In their professional response roles (first responder, public official, etc.), using skills from the NOVA training by responding with the state or local NOVA-trained Crisis Response Team and/or by official deploymet from the NOVA headquarters. NOVA only deploys with an official invitation from an authorized individuals. Most invitations are referred back to a state or local team with expressed support for mutual aid if needed. Some national deployments, because of the scale, scope, media exposure or expertise specifically requested, are coordinated through NOVA’s national office. While the level of need dictates the response, the National Crisis Responder Credentialing Program is often on the first-call list.
There must be enough participants registered to cover the costs for NOVA, usually ranging between 10-15 trainees. Interested in hosting a Regional Training? Please read below for the steps to do so!
To order a manual, please complete this form and submit it to NOVA via email at crt@trynova.org, fax to 703-535-5500 or mail 510 King Street, Suite 424, Alexandria VA 22314.
Founded in 1975, NOVA is the oldest national victim assistance organization of its type in the United States and is the recognized leader in victim advocacy, education and credentialing.