Schools get ready to deal with natural catastrophes |24 March 2017

What do we do if during school hours we have a tsunami, flooding or any other natural catastrophe? A question that not only requires thought but also thorough preparation.

In order to be better prepared, a consultative workshop on ‘Seychelles Educational Institutions Emergency Planning Guide’ was organised by Division of Risk and Disaster Management (DRDM), Ministry of Education and Fire Services yesterday at the STC conference room. All head teachers, staff of DRDM, the principal secretaries in the Ministry of Education and the Social Affairs department, Dr Odile Decommarmond and Linda William-Melanie respectively, Paul Labaleine, director general of DRDM attended this consultative meeting.

“The Educational Institutions Emergency Plan was developed from three and a half years of experience on the field meeting with teachers and understanding their needs; doing risk assessments in the educational institutions; setting up emergency teams and organising for trainings with the guidance of the government owned Education Contingency Plan; from examples of other countries’ Emergency Educational Institution Plans, developed to be actively used alongside all work done on the field, with the assistance of a great team from the SFRSA, Red Cross and the Ministry of Education,”explained Regina  Prosper, responsible of communication at DRDM.

“The Ministry of Education and Human Resource Development is committed to ensuring that our institutions are safe and free from hazards, so that all institutions will have a more conducive learning environment. We will all agree that we need to be more resilient in mitigating the negative effects of any eventuality and we need to be prepared when disaster calls. And for this we need to have a good plan. Our ministry believes that capacity building is the key to the operation of this plan for our schools. Our commitment towards ensuring safety in our institutions has been evident in the funds that have been allocated for the different safety components. For example, we are now in the process of installing and connecting firefighting equipment in all schools. All safety signs have already been printed and will be distributed to schools during the course of next week. First Aid boxes have already been procured and will be in the country soon. Each school will receive five boxes as per the planm,” said Dr Decommarmond.

She also mentioned that in collaboration with the Fire Rescue and Emergency Services, fire prevention and usage of “fire fighting equipment” training have been scheduled for five participants per school during the April holiday.

In his intervention, Mr Labaleine noted it is the first time that we do not have any foreign consultant working on this project.

“We have a full Seychellois crew and are proud of this. We, at DRDM, have a duty to protect the country and to make sure we are all safe. We have had some scary moments recently like cyclone Felleng and flooding and these remind us constantly that we are not far from danger. Sometimes we feel that nobody is listening. To save lives, you have to get it right the first time. My advice to all directors of schools is that you need to understand the risks you are facing at schools and that during the time of emergency you will be the commanding officer. The people of the country need to be educated and healthy. It will be a disaster if our people are unaware of the dangers that can come to us. Once we validate this plan, then we will work on the next.”

Rodney Philo, director of Health and Safety at the Ministry of Education also noted that “the purpose of this consultation is for the head teachers to understand the plan and how they will have to adapt/change and implement it in their own schools according to the environment around the school. With the effect of global warming, schools in Seychelles should be more resilient and ready to face any eventual situation. A national evacuation exercise in collaboration with other partners will be organised in the schools this year, and in case of any difficulties, we will help them improve their emergency plan.”

People involved in doing the field visits and reports are:  Patrick Payet (SFRSA),  Simon Nourrice (SFRSA), Collette Servina (Seychelles Red Cross Society), Rodney Philo (MoE) and Regina Prosper (DRDM).