Mortuary Mayhem

We have very exciting news, renowned speaker and restorative art educator Dominic Astorino can now add author to his titles. Dominic's first book, Postmortem Restorative Art, Principles, Methods and Applications will be released on January 16th in time for the spring 2025 semester. If you have not adopted his Restorative Art book yet, now is your chance. Students will receive e-book access to start the semester if their book will not arrive in time. This restorative art book brings real life examples into the classroom, color photographs and step by step instructions on difficult restorations. This RA book takes our learning to a new level. Your host Prof. Shea has been honored to teach with the preliminary version of this book all semester. Great for both students and experienced practitioners alike. To order your book visit Cognella publishing at https://titles.cognella.com/postmortem-restorative-art-9781793587473?srsltid=AfmBOoox6La5xQ-pLPH2j1-kuKPdGatbeveEpnarud7gSZyCKiD0GSsy.

We sat down with Chase Downs of Gather, one of the industries premiere funeral home softwares that is on the cutting edge of what the industry needs. Join us as we discuss how funeral home software provides value and how the industry has changed and what features you should be using to keep up and be efficient.

Did you miss the NFDA convention this year, get a quick recap of some of the seminars and vendors.

We sat down with Brie Smith of Return Home one of the first Terramation companies in the country as she covers the process, what we can expect and the beauty behind this new form of disposition. Terramation, also known as Natural Organic Reduction or Human Composting is a natural process of converting the body to soil. A very environmentally safe process that promotes new life and the byproduct being soil can be used to plant, garden or to scatter in your favorite location. All the sentimental factors that come with cremation such as jewelry and keepsakes can still happen since it provides a very dry product that does not smell or have the soil consistency until it gets wet meaning it can sit on a shelf or in your favorite locket.

You read that right, the two funeral programs in Massachusetts situated at Community Colleges, Cape Cod Community Colleges funeral program in Bridgewater Mass on the Bridgewater State University Campus and North Shore Community College's funeral program in Danvers are both free to Massachusetts Residents that do not have a prior Bachelor degree or higher. Both institutions still provide a reduced tuition rate to those in New England, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Also check out ContinuingVision.com for your CE credit. Yours truly will be offering the OSHA course so don't hesitate and sign up for this required part of your CE.

We sat down with Bill A Johnston author and owner of Post and Boost as he discusses his new book "The Consumer's Journey to Purchasing Funeral Services: A Marketing Roadmap for Growing Market Share and Revenue"

Join us with Kim Zavrotny from Funeral Professionals Peer Support. FPPS is a non-profit that provides peer-based mental wellness support to bereavement professionals worldwide. Visit funeralpeersupport.com for more information. This is a great program providing free monthly peer meetings specific to students, funeral directors, embalmers, cemetery professionals and other death care employees. Membership includes an extensive EAP program, webinars, 24 access to therapists and much more. Join us as we discuss how funeral service differs from other professions requiring specialized peer support and how Funeral Professionals Peer Support helps.

Join as as we continue the conversation with Faith Haug Department Chair of Mortuary Science at Arapahoe Community College in Colorado. This is part two of transitioning funeral service as we move into how students are today and how the industry will change with them.

Episode 17 : Funeral service is transitioning - Join us as Faith Haug discusses with Dan Shea and Jess Clasby how funeral service can grow and serve clients as more transgender funeral professionals and students feel comfortable becoming their true self as well as serving families and navigating conversations at the arrangment conference. How to incorporate proper pronouns and prefered names while still abiding by the law on legal paperwork. How do we navigate using two names with an insistant family and how do we work with families that may not be as accepting or affirming as we are. This is the longest episode to date as we dive into the educational system, students today and cover quite a few topics that you are sure to enjoy. This is part one, join us for part two for episode 18 as the conversation continues about funeral students today.

This month we compare two popular mortuary simulation games with real life management.

What does it mean to go the extra mile and how do we collectively improve. As an industry we either grow together or we sink together. We need to do the extra stuff and leave our comfort zone. It is the seminars, speakers, conferences and allow us to grow and learn how to improve based on others work. Preventing a stagnant environment requires the extra mile.

Join us as Prof. Shea covers study techniques that will prepare you for your semester and academic career no matter what field you are studying for.

Join us for a chat with Chelsea Cush, funeral director, embalmer and mortuary educator. Chelsea is a licensed Funeral Director and Embalmer in Michigan and Pennsylvania and teaches for the Pittsburgh Institute of Mortuary Science, PIMS.

The NFDA's arranger training is a great opportunity to sharpen your skills at the arrangement conference and in general will make you better at funeral home operation and management. This eight hour day will be a mixture of learning, interacting, networking and practicing your skills. Melissa Loose offers a dynamic day of learning and when you leave you will be empowered to bring what you have learned back to the families you serve. Cape Cod Community College will be hosting this training September 29th 2023 in Bridgewater Massachusetts on the Bridgewater State University Campus where they reside. To sign up go to NFDA.org/Arrangertraining

Join us as we cover how a funeral director and embalmer can approach suicide related deaths and tell the deceased story the way the family wants.

Following Governor Maura Healey's announcement of Mass Reconnect we sat down the the President of Cape Cod Community College, Dr. John Cox to discuss this monumental moment that will open doors and break down barriers to education. If you are 25 or older and ready to pursue your first college degree or maybe you have started but never finished, visit CapeCod.edu/Free for more information on Mass Reconnect.

Emma Waugh, Public Health Program Coordinator for the United South and Eastern Tribes - USET joins us this to discuss how funeral directors can better serve Native Americans, their tribes, death certificate misclassification and funeral directors can do to correct this. USET also provides training throughout the United States at your location.

Joe Reardon joins Melissa in discussing cremation and how it affects the modern funeral director. What can we do to serve families better and keep up with the times.

As the spring semester starts, we thought it would be beneficial to provide another lecture from the Cape Cod Community College Funeral Service Lecture Series. This time we bring you to test taking and study techniques with Dr. Shea. Dr. Shea ran a board exam review course for emergency physicians in the 90s. The physicians realizing that test taking was a skill that far surpassed topic knowledge alone asked that test taking skills be added to the review course. Most mistakes made on an exam are because the test taker read the question wrong. Learn how to properly interpret questions with this months episode. The full lecture with accompanying slides can be found on the Cape Cod Community College YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/gdEJTEVRPBQ

Shawna Rodabaugh returns to the show this month to discuss quality embalming and the problems the funeral industry faces with embalming, why are we not getting the quality we expect.