Being prepared for life’s disasters, can help get us thru many storms.  Learning to be prepared as a youth impacts you for a lifetime.  

The Harlan County Agriculture and Natural Resources Agent along with Harlan County Emergency Management created the Harlan County Youth Preparedness Program. Three students from Harlan County High School participated in and graduated from the after-school program to learn more about disaster preparedness and how to react during those events.  During the 18 session course, students responded to disaster scenarios where they developed experience to face issues and leadership skills thru the Citizen Emergency Response Team (CERT) curriculum.  Each week, they acquired a new skill set that included disaster preparedness, medical operations, search and rescue, weather awareness, fire safety and utility control, crisis awareness, smoke alarm placement, amateur radio communications, search and rescue, SKYWARN Spotter training, Stop The Bleed and CPR/AED usage.  One student completed an extra assignment with online FEMA certifications in IS-100 and IS-200, while another student applied for a Stop The Bleed grant that would help the school receive Stop The Bleed kits. Students interacted with professionals in the fire service, public safety, emergency management and medical response and discovered career opportunities.  As part of the certification process, each student had to help their family build an emergency preparedness kit they also had to identify and teach five other families how to build an emergency preparedness kit.  Due to this course, 18 families created emergency preparedness kits to aid each of them when the time comes.  These eight students gained valuable life skills thru leadership development along with preparedness.  

Students were asked to give an Impact Statement on what they learned from the program. Here are a few quotes:

"I have learned hot to use a fire extinguisher, hot to do CPR and I have acquired an ample amount of other skills as well."  "...the one training that has impacted me the most ...would be CPR/AED training as it is the most valuable and potentially life saving skill."  "I enjoyed the Stop The Bleed program the best."  "I feel like I could use my skills that I've learned to help the patient..."