Temple Christian School staff learns about disaster preparedness and Safety Policy Implementation. (BIS photo/Kristaan Ingraham)
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Nassau, Bahamas -- The
National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) of The Bahamas is developing
Disaster Preparedness Management Plans for all schools in the country, and Temple
Christian School, which
consists
of two divisions, a high school and a pre and elementary school, is one of the
first schools the Agency is working with.
NEMA Operations/Training
Officer, Luke Bethel, gave a short presentation on June 18 to the Executives
and staff at Temple Christian School to familiarise them with disaster
preparedness plans NEMA along with CDEMA, the regional organisation known as
the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency, have to offer.
He explained that
CDEMA is the lead agency for receiving financial donations and technical
assistance from around the world. The
aid and technical assistance is channelled through the organisation to go
throughout The Bahamas and the entire Caribbean. “When we are in distress, we
can call on CDEMA. They provided this template to us; so we want to recognise
them a bit.”
Mr. Bethel said, “We
are not forcing you to take a plan, but if you do not have a plan, we are here
to make this available to Temple Christian School and to all schools throughout
The Commonwealth of The Bahamas.”
He said he is going
to send out a school safety policy framework to administrators, principals,
faculty, and staff. It will give them a
template to create a school emergency management team, as there must be a team
in place to manage the plan.
He said, “Please
volunteer to become members and participate. You are the second school. The College of The Bahamas had 20 persons and
I am very proud of this.
“I am going to ask
you to set some deadlines, possible deadlines of when you want to adopt this
plan and how you intend to implement it and who is going to be the team in
working with it.”
