Develop and share an emergency response plan for a school
Original forum discussion/topic post is as follows:
School environments present many aspects for consideration in crises prevention and intervention planning. Depending upon a child’s developmental and functional capabilities, the information he or she can retain and execute in a crisis or emergency may be limited. As members of crisis teams, collaborative efforts with school officials, parents, and communities are needed to minimize negative effects of crisis events.
For this week’s forum, develop and share an emergency response plan for a school with a student population of at least 800.
In your plan, discuss the type of crisis events or emergencies for which the plan is appropriate.
Be inclusive, providing the details needed to understand who is involved in executing the plan, how it will be done, and the rationale suggesting the best methods are being implemented.
Forum post response #1
Good Evening Professor & Classmates,
This week’s lessons we discuss and go over School Violence, and how we can help those who have experienced or may experience school violence. These traumatic experiences can vary from natural disasters to violent acts of crime. No matter the trauma and experience, it is always necessary to have some form of crisis intervention and a crisis plan depending on the act being committed (natural disaster, violent act, etc.). Every school has one of multiple crisis prevention plans that they prepare each school year.
The first plan I am discussing would be that of any First Aid that may be necessary within a school environment. In the state of Administering First Aid, it is important that all employees are trained on the emergency plan and there should be an accessible copy at all times. A minimum of one individual besides the school nurse should be trained in both CPR and First Aid. Also, those who work in high risk areas such as gyms, labs, and shops, etc. should be trained in CPR, First Aid, and AED. These would be utilized within immediate care of youth. Each teacher is to have an updated copy of those who are enrolled in their class, First Aid kits should be stocked and in every classroom to include high risk areas, and all central locations. Lastly there shall be an employee who is trained in emergency preparedness when working with children of special needs.
The second plan I am discussing is that of a shooting/weapons/kidnapping/hostage. This has seemed to become a very hot topic over the past few years. It is important to teach the school districts and their employees LEAST (Lockdown, Evacuation, and Survival Tactics). First when there is an activity that falls under a shooting/weapons/kidnapping/hostage it is important to allow Law Enforcement to do their job, and engage with the shooting/weapons/kidnapping/hostage. No teacher should try and assist unless necessary. Those who are involved in executing this plan would be that of the campus monitors, the administration team, and the teachers. There would be code names for each situation that all staff would be fully aware of and trained extensively in. Lastly, each teacher is to have an updated copy of those who are enrolled in their class.
The third plan I am discussing is that of natural disasters. With a natural disaster there may be some warning signs, but often times there is no determination of when or how a disaster may strike. The first aspect to take into consideration would be making sure the schools buildings are up to code and the furniture is secured. Secondly it would be important to make sure teachers and students are familiar with all safety procedures. Third, I would make sure that there are drills conducted as necessary based on the geographical location and that evacuations plans were practiced and followed. Lastly, each teacher is to have an updated copy of those who are enrolled in their class.
Forum post response #2
It is becoming more popular to have crisis situations in schools today. Everyone deals with traumatic events differently. School shootings are the main focus in society today especially high schools. The sad thing is that most of the time when these school shootings happen it is because the people doing the shooting is doing it because they were bullied at one time. For instance, look at the Columbine High School shooting. It was said that the two students were bullied for quite some time and this was why they planned the revenge that they did. When it comes to high school people are on different levels emotionally. There needs to be a plan to put the 9thgraders in one section, 10thgraders in one section, 11thgraders in one section, 12thgraders in one section, an injured section, section with people who maybe knew the people doing the shooting, and then a section of people who knew the victims. There could also be a section of people who witnessed what was going on. There would be several crisis counselors in each section to help when needed. With a size of 800 students, you would need a lot of people to help with the crisis intervention. You could designate safe zones outside of the school for each section listed. This really could work for any type of crisis situation not just a shooting. I think that the important thing is for school officials, parents, and the community to not panic in emergency situations as scary as they may be because if students see them panic then they will start to panic even more.
The important thing in school violence is that it takes a village to help a school this size with a tragedy like school shootings. School counselors need to be ready to help during this time to help students learn adaptive coping skills before an event even occurs and even during an event. This is something that could start immediately and afterwards to help people cope with the event that has happened by doing group therapy or individual sessions. Teachers are the frontline interactions to serve several key roles in both crisis prevention and crisis response. Teachers are capable of providing single-session crisis interventions and serving on crisis-response teams. There are school psychologists that are there to help to ensure that every child learns in a safe, healthy, and supportive environment. They provide consultation, assessment, intervention, and education. Also, there are school social workers there to help students and teachers during a time of crisis. These are all people you want on your team to help the students cope with the tragedy going on.
The first thing I would do is develop a crisis response planning committee. This would be a variety of people such as school district personnel, community social services, and agencies that would need to respond to a crisis in any facility within a school district. This is where the policies and procedures would be made and decided on. Once the plan is in place I would have a school wide training day to train everyone on the crisis response plan so they are prepared if something were to happen. Any time someone new is hired I would make sure it was part of their orientation training. This plan has the interventions for the first 24 hours of the crisis, the first three days, and the first week following the crisis. There will be an assessment plan that consists of a variety of things. It will consist of how many students there are, which students are affected, what level of response will be required, how to inform the school community, how to provide group and individual services, how to communicate with parents, and which services are needed. These services may be immediate crisis intervention, safe room discussion groups, and classroom intervention with trained personnel. I would even create a special crisis resource kit that summarizes the crisis response plan. This kit will include all the above questions that need to be asked, a map of the school, keys to all the doors of the school, safe room locations, name tags for the crisis team members, parent networks, telephone numbers of mental health professionals, emergency numbers and more.
The best way to implement this plan is for a certain sound to go off in the school and the teachers will recognize the sound and will get right to work with the crisis response plan in place and start getting students to the place that they need them to get to after they scan the area around them to make sure it is safe. This is why the training beforehand is so important so when these situations there is less panic and people know what to do.
Forum post response #3
This emergency response plan is for a high school with a population of close to 900 students. The emergency response plan is proposed to be appropriate for crises to include violent acts or threats to the safety of students and/or staff members.
The emergency response plan was developed by the school’s identified crisis response planning committee, to include the school board president, school principal, school nurse, school social worker, school psychologist, community-based child psychologist, emergency crisis response team supervisor, police chief, and fire chief.
After conducting a school-wide crisis needs assessment, it was determined that the school is vulnerable to gang-related activity and potential school shootings. The needs assessment also determined that there is a need for more frequent staff training in crisis response. The staff trainings will be implemented every 6 months (instead of annually).
The school’s crisis response team will include six school counselors, two school psychologists, two school social workers, principle and vice principle, two school security officers, two special education and two general education teachers from each grade level, two community-based mental health professionals, and two community-based emergency crises workers. The team will meet every three months to provide updated school risk information and community-based resources and review and practice table-top crisis response interventions. Within the team are members identified to participate in the following crisis response roles: crisis response coordinator (vice principal); crisis intervention coordinator (school psychologist); media liaison (principal); security liaison (school security officer); parent liaison (school social worker); crisis counselors (school counselors).
Collins & Collins (2005) mention creating a crisis resource kit. The crisis team will have access to the resources that comprise the kit (a school map with locations of school phones, designated meeting rooms and care centers keys to all doors of the school, name tags for crisis team members, an updated master schedule of classes, a list of all enrolled students, phone numbers of mental health counselors and emergency responders, contact information for parents and parent networks, emergency numbers for all faculty and staff, and contact information of local clergy). An assessment of all students with special needs and how to mobilize them to a designated safe area (i.e. identified care center) will also be included in the crisis plan, along with designated coordinators (two school counselors).
When an identified crisis were to arise, the crisis response team would be notified to begin plan implementation. Team members will be expected to collaborate to review their roles and responsibilities with efficiency. However, it will also be at team members’ professional and personal discretion to communicate their needs for self-care “time-outs,” to avoid added stress or trauma. Also as important will be debriefing and appropriate support resources for crisis team members after such elevated levels of response.
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