Background
The earthquake-prone Los Angeles area is home to a large Armenian community proud of its culture of resilience and survival following such devastating events as the 1999 Izmit earthquake in Turkey. The diaspora of Armenians from Turkey to the Los Angeles area resulted in the development of political and cultural institutions that created strong bonds in the community, strong social cohesion, and robust relationships between generations. Many of the community's children attend parochial Armenian schools, making schools an important focal point for disaster preparedness and response.
Specific issues
- No state laws on disaster preparedness in nonpublic schools. California laws regarding implementation of school disaster preparedness procedures do not apply to private/parochial schools, nor are there any other means of enforcing or overseeing disaster preparedness in nonpublic schools.
- Schools as community focal points. Armenian schools serve as a central point for community organizations and events, making involvement of the entire community necessary for preparedness programs.
The practice
Four parochial Armenian schools in the Los Angeles region provided teachers with earthquake preparedness training and held response exercises with students and staff.
Four parochial Armenian schools, in collaboration with the University of California Los Angeles School of Public Health, implemented a disaster preparedness curriculum and program within their educational systems that included the following components:
- Planning: Before developing a curriculum and exercise protocol, planners created an emergency plan template, conducted a needs assessment, and evaluated the state of resources and funding that could be devoted to preparedness activities.
- Training: Three training sessions for teachers covered approximately 8 hours of information on school preparedness, the Incident Command System (ICS), CPR and first aid, and search and rescue.
- Exercise: Four Armenian schools, comprising approximately 650 students and 70 teachers and staff members per school, held an exercise that put into practice information presented in training sessions.
One of these schools with students in grades 1 to 8—Vahan & Anoush Chamlian Armenian School — conducted a 2-hour earthquake preparedness and response exercise on June 1, 2011. Staff, faculty, and students were trained in and assumed various roles, including those of injured people or search-and-rescue team members.
The exercise began at 9 AM, at which point an emergency alarm sounded for 60 seconds to mimic the duration of an earthquake. As the alarm rang, teachers instructed their classes to drop, cover, and hold onto something secure. After maintaining their positions in the classrooms during the "earthquake," students were led to the schoolyard and instructed to file into color-coded areas by grade.
Teachers and staff —who had been designated and trained as team leaders in student care, security and safety, search and rescue, planning, student and staff accounting, and medical services—carried out planned procedures involving scenarios of hurt staff and students, including organizing student pick-up with parents. Student and staff "accounting" teams managed student rosters and coordinated emergency information for students and teachers.
School planners estimated that 17 to 20 hours were allocated for planning, 7.5 hours for training staff and teachers, and 4.5 hours to conduct an evaluation.
What made this practice possible?
- School planners researched precedents in school preparedness, including emergency plans for public schools, examples of best practices, and public safety/legal considerations for conducting training and exercises.
- Having a teacher or administrator advocate for the preparedness program and the involvement of the UCLA School of Public Health was critical, especially in such a close-knit community.
- Involvement of each school's Parent Teacher Association facilitated the involvement of students and allowed planners to design an exercise that was fairly complex and covered a range of scenarios.
Results
- A first for Armenian schools. The training and exercise curriculum represented the first structured earthquake preparedness program used by these four Armenian schools. Before this program was implemented, schools had prepared for earthquakes only by holding classroom evacuation drills.
- Lessons learned from the experience included:
- High school students, while not technically part of the exercise, wished to help when they found out about the program. Forming high school student groups to help in future exercises is expected to increase the number of people willing and able to respond to an earthquake.
- Using the ICS in a school setting proved slightly challenging, because normal job titles, responsibilities, and hierarchies did not always correspond to staff's designated ICS roles.
Notes
Armenian schools wish to sustain the earthquake preparedness program and hold additional exercises in the future. Ongoing elements may include offering more training sessions for teachers and staff, seeking additional involvement from parents, and forming preparedness groups with high school students.
