top of page

Community Education

Our Community Education programs facilitate constructive conversations in the community about serious illness, caregiving challenges, end-of-life and grief. 

CaringMatters strives to develop community knowledge and skills around serious illness, caregiving challenges, end-of-life and grief-related topics that can be applied to daily life. Our meaningful educational events and discussions help build a caring and compassionate community.

For information on Community Education, please contact

Leigh Bluestein, leighb@caringmatters.org or 301-990-7927

Thank you to our Community Education funding partner

aarp_MD Red Logo.png

Upcoming Workshop

At A Loss: Online Writing Workshop
Dates: April 11, 2024, 7:00pm - 8:30pm 

Facilitator: Karen Paul, MFA

*The workshop is now FULL! Thank you for your interest!

​

Grief needs expression. Spending time with your grief, getting to know its contours and writing about it helps with the process of integrating your grief into your story and learning to live with it. In these writing workshops, offered free of charge, participants will be given ideas and prompts for writing about loss and grief. Each online workshop will be a private, safe place to write your story, to share it if you choose, and to use words and language to make sense of your feelings.

Karen-Paul-portrait_edited.jpg

Karen Paul is a Montgomery County, Maryland, resident and writer who has used CaringMatters’ services and now serves on the CaringMatters Board of Trustees. Karen writes often about loss and grief and her work has been published widely, including in the Washington Post, New York Times, Boston Globe, Modern Loss, Lilith Magazine, San Antonio Review, Open Secrets, and Motherwell. Karen has an MFA in creative writing from the Vermont College of Fine Arts and is working on a memoir about widowhood. 

Past Community Education Presentations Include:

​

  • Webinar: Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy: Extending Compassion and Whole Person Healing

  • Webinar: Cognitive Change: Understanding, Connecting, and Creating Moments of Joy 

  • Webinar - Prepare for the Inevitable: Financial Planning to Prepare for the Death of a Family Member

  • Webinar - Seniors and Social Isolation

  • Webinar - Suffocated Grief and Black Youth Coping with Loss

  • Webinar - How to Support Grieving People with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities

  • Webinar - Caregiver Stress in Asian American Communities

  • Webinar - Providing Inclusive and Affirming Care for the LGBTQ+ Community

  • Webinar - Caring for the Caregiver

  • Webinar - The End-of-Life Doulas: A Collaborative Approach to End-of-Life Care

  • Webinar - Grief Support for the Black Community: Understanding the Culture of Trauma and Developing an Empathy-Driven Mindset

  • Webinar: Grief: Support for Yourself and Those You Care About

  • Webinar - Grief in the Workplace: Guidance for Employees and Employers

  • Webinar - ​Voice Your Choice: Preparing for Health Care Emergencies

  • Webinar - Speaking Grief Film Discussion

  • Webinar - LGBTQ+ Seriously Ill Seniors: Opportunities for Better Care

  • Webinar - Grief and Self-Care in the Time of COVID-19

  • Webinar - Supporting Grieving Students After a Death: How We Can Help Them Build Resilience in a Time of Physical Distancing

  • Navigating Transitions for Your Loved One's Care

  • Nine To Ninety Film Screening & Discussion

  • Caregivers' Toolkit: Community Resources for Patients & Families Facing Serious Illness

  • Voices of Grief Film Screening & Discussion

  • Managing Grief in the Age of 24-Hour News & Social Media

bottom of page