Montgomery Public Schools Emergency Response Team Trains for Evacuations
At anytime disaster could strike schools, prompting teachers and emergency officials to act fast for evacuation.
Montgomery Public Schools Emergency Response Team is making sure they are ready in the event that something does happen. The team includes nurses, faculty and staff.
“In a tough situation, you don’t want to be reacting to something. You want to have a plan definitely in place and be proactive in the way that you handle those things so you don’t react adversely to the situation,” says MPS Director of Operations Chad Anderson.
That is why Montgomery Public School’s Emergency Response Team is actively training for possible scenarios for evacuation using Garrett Coliseum – one of many school evacuation check-points in the city.
“This is for the mass larger areas in our district – the high schools and the bigger junior highs to come to a bigger area,” says Anderson.
“The building is so unique that it’s perfectly suited for an evacuation of this type for getting children in safely and getting children taken care of here safely.And then exiting safely to their parents at home,” says Bill Harden, Director of Events and Marketing at Garrett Coliseum.
The training allows MPS nurses, faculty and staff to move students safely and securely with bus transportation.
“Anytime we need to evacuate a school there are a lot of moving parts that go along with it and we want to make sure we do that appropriately and handle it the right way and be the most sensitive that we can in those situations but also be the most effective we can,” says Anderson.
While some MPS officials have evacuated in the past, that was before agreements like this were in place with Garrett Coliseum.
“Our biggest thing is making sure that we are being proactive on top of things and have a great communication line as far as where things go and knowing exactly what our jobs are in those areas,” says Anderson.
In the event that a school is evacuated MPS officials say parents will be given up-to-date information through the school system’s Robocall system and also online.
While Garrett Coliseum serves as the biggest evacuation center for MPS schools, Alabama State University’s Acadome and several churches are also used for evacuations.
