How to Prepare a School for an Earthquake

Emergency Management: Earthquake and School Safety
The preparatory tasks regarding facilities that need to be conducted in order to safely prepare for an earthquake at the school are the following: 1) the school’s structure should be checked by engineers to ensure that it can safely withstand an earthquake, and if the structure fails inspection, it should be fixed so that vulnerable weaknesses are mitigated; 2) students and staff should be educated on what to do in the case of an earthquake: this means that the school in its entirety has to be familiar with earthquake drills (which should be routinely practiced just like fire drills) and that the “drop, cover and hold on” policy is understood by all; 3) preparations should be made regarding having a cache of supplies on hand to last 2 weeks in the case of an earthquake that devastates the community. In such cases, the school will very likely need to be used as a place of shelter, so supplies must be on hand and the school and its community members must be made aware of how they can all assist in banding together to help people in need overcome their struggles; 4) in the event of an earthquake, it is important that everyone be accounted for, and for this reason the school should have a search and rescue team in place; this team should know what is expected of its members should they be called into service.
The kinds of stakeholder communications that should have already been conducted prior to a potential earthquake should be to inform the community about the state of the school’s facilities, its back-up supplies, its student and staff preparedness in the case of an earthquake, the role that the school will play in terms of providing shelter to those in need in the event of an earthquake, and the role that the school’s search and rescue team will play in the case of missing persons in the school going unaccounted for. This message can be communicated via letter, via email, via school meetings with the community, and via school newsletter publications.
The agency that would work well to ensure the structural soundness of the school would be FEMA (2010), which has published several guidelines for schools to use to assess their structural soundness. Structural engineers can also be called in locally to provide a full inspection of the school’s structure. This step should be taken in conjunction with the utilization of FEMA recommended guidelines, which should be implemented as well.
The school facilities should be prepared and equipped to deal with potential earthquake damage, or if not damaged to serve the community in case of disaster. This means that all stakeholders in the school should first of all know the roles that are expected of them. As the school represents the community, its duties in the face of a communal disaster like an earthquake are to respond to the community’s needs. Students and staff should organize into units to canvass the neighborhoods of the communities, going house to house, to make sure that everyone has what he or she needs. Special attention should be given to homes or families that do not have much support internally speaking. These groups should be organized beforehand and team leaders should be appointed with members’ contact information taken so that communications can be effectively delivered in the case of an emergency happening.
The school should also be able to address community housing issues should it still be standing as a suitable structure. In this case, students and staff will have duties towards turning classrooms and halls into temporary housing units for those families and individuals in need of shelter. Facilities will have to be cleaned and furnished and enough provisions will have to be on hand to ensure that there is plenty of drinking water of food supplies to last for two weeks. Students and staff will have to be organized again to take part in providing services to the needy members of the community, and these teams will be tasked with maintaining facilities, ensuring cleanliness so that disease does not become a problem, cooking and serving food, and responding to other emergencies. Teams should train with emergency crews in the community that offer training on how to handle emergency situations like an earthquake.
Should the school be damaged in the event of an earthquake, students and staff will be expected to exit the premises in an orderly fashion after taking cover during the earthquake. In such a case, order is highly imperative and the school must ensure that everyone is accounted for. Roll call must be conducted and if there are missing persons it will be the task of the search and rescue team (organized beforehand) to find the missing persons and to save them in case they are trapped. The school will also be off limits to personnel and students while in a state of disrepair, and local, regional, state and federal officials will be on call to aid in addressing any emergency situations at the school that require immediate response.
In conclusion, an earthquake is a major emergency situation that can put a school’s resources to the test. Students, staff, supplies, equipment, structure, and planning are all important when preparing for an earthquake. Drills must be exercised, structure must be assessed and ensured, teams should be organized and ready to implement pre-planned measures to assist in helping the community. The school can serve as a shelter if it is not damaged and its students and staff can work to serve the community in its time of need.
References
FEMA. (2010). Design Guide for Improving School Safety in Earthquakes, Floods, and High Winds. Retrieved from https://www.fema.gov/media-library/assets/documents/5264#