Teen SERT

A group of Chatham County high school students has become the first team in the southeast to complete a Teen Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) program. Homeland Security money has funded the program at Jordan-Matthews. The students will be formally recognized for their accomplishments during the school awards night on May 29.

CERT training is designed to prepare individuals to help themselves, their families, and their neighbors in the event of a catastrophic disaster. Because emergency services personnel would not be able to help everyone immediately, CERT team members can make a difference by using the training they received through the program.

There are nine students, two from Chatham Central and seven from Jordan-Matthews, who have completed the Teen CERT training course. Starting on April 3, the students met twice each week to complete CERT units. The units included emergency preparedness, emergency medical operations, light search and rescue operations, disaster psychology and terrorism. They even learned about incident command and triage.

Following are the Teen Cert team members. The Chatham Central students are seniors Krista Smith and Angelica Page. The juniors from Jordan-Matthews are Tyler Sauls and LaTreyu Williams. The Jordan-Matthews sophomores are Megan Bowers, Christopher Dunn, Stephanie Dunn, Larry Sullivan, and Renee Robinson.

Various community emergency professionals taught the units. For instance, Fire Marshal Tom Bender taught the fire safety unit. Detective Joe Burchett of the Chatham County Sheriff’s Office taught the light search and rescue unit. Jessie Espiricueta, an interpreter with the Chatham Family Resource Center, taught the disaster psychology. Tahira Subuda, CERT Coordinator for Chatham County, is a Teen CERT trainer who taught the course. Donna Johnson, a health occupations teacher at Jordan-Matthews and a former disaster preparedness coordinator for the county, helped organize the program at the school.

On Thursday, May 8, the students conducted a disaster simulation after school on the Jordan-Matthews campus during which they assisted mock victims.

“I am estatic that Jordan-Matthews has the first Teen CERT team in the state and southeast. It has been a huge commitment on the part of the students to go through the program. The students will be part of the school emergency plan such as assisting in building evacuation during fire drills. In the community, they will help at community events like public health fairs. We are always looking to expand the program to other counties across the state,” commented Subuda.

The entire Chatham County CERT program is under the umbrella of the Citizen Corps Council. The Council has five active adult CERT teams with 105 members. Chatham County is nationally known for its level of citizen participation and preparedness. Fearrington Village, Governor’s Club, and several area churches have trained cert teams.

Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) has a CERT competitive event in which the Jordan-Matthews chapter competed at the state level in early March. The team consisted of two Chatham Central seniors, Brittany Edwards and Kristin Walls. Chatham Central does not have Health Occupations classes so students from that school participate in the Jordan-Matthews program. The pair will compete at the national level during the June conference in Dallas.

“I am excited and proud that we have the first state winners for HOSA in this new competition,” said Johnson.

Beth McCullough

05/08/2008

Central Office

919-542-3626

8 a.m.- 5 p.m. M-F

mailto:beth@chatham.k12.nc.us

This page was last modified on Thursday, January 07, 2010 05:50:42 PM

Chatham Citizen Corps Council

For more information on emerging health threats and how to prepare for them, be sure to check out our "What Do I Do?" page.