National Service-Learning Partnership: Ideas for Service-Learning focused on Hurricane/Disaster Preparation and Relief

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Ideas for Service-Learning focused on Hurricane/Disaster Preparation and Relief
- Based on ideas and examples submitted by the Florida Alliance for Student Service

Note: Although many of the ideas listed below are described in terms of service activities/projects, they can be developed into strong school-based service-learning experiences by embedding ideas into the curriculum. The subject areas listed will help you to connect service ideas with learning objectives. Many of the ideas are multi-disciplinary.

Arts

Students educate the public through plays, skits, songs, poems, and art. Songs can be recorded and shown on local cable channels.

Civic Education

Older students can work with adults to develop a transportation system for individuals and families living in shelters or relocated without personal vehicles. Transportation could be provided to run errands, go to church, or to be relocated (within reason) to family/friends/new homes nearby.
Students can organize a school/community campaign to collect new and gently used backpacks and school supplies to be donated through Do Something's "We've Got Your Back" campaign.
Education/Advocacy programs to raise awareness about building codes and disasters (public presentations, lessons to younger peers, presentations to parents, disaster preparation fairs, letters to the editor, media campaigns, creation of web sites, public service announcements on radio and TV, in-school TV productions, etc.)
Students develop advocacy campaigns to strengthen communities and protect vulnerable populations, like senior citizens, individuals who are sick, and those without reliable transportation.
Students can partner with the Red Cross to use its Masters of Disaster curriculum to learn about general disaster preparedness, hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, lightning, and earthquakes. Students then design disaster preparedness projects based on community needs.
Using the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) curriculum, students get trained to prepare for and respond to school and community emergencies as part of a youth CERT. The CERT training program is a 20-hour course that can be delivered over a seven-week period as part of a course, such as a First Aid/Safety elective class. The curriculum covers disaster preparedness, disaster fire suppression, basic disaster medical operations, light search and rescue, and team operations. The curriculum also includes a disaster simulation in which participants practice skills learned throughout the course. CERT members can also help with non-emergency projects that help improve community safety. High school students trained in CERT can also teach younger students about emergency kits, disaster planning, and curriculum specific to Hazardous Weather Week.
Students create products that teach homeowners, builders, and others about building codes and disaster preparation, mitigation, response, and recovery (brochures, videos, tip sheets, models of disaster-resistant homes, disaster preparation kits, etc.)
Students develop public service announcements on hurricane safety to be disseminated through closed-circuit television on school campuses.
Students produce public service announcements (PSAs) on disaster readiness, flyers, and a video for senior citizens.

Conflict Resolution

In schools that take in displaced students, students implement a peer mediation and conflict resolution program to reduce violence in a potentially overcrowded and newly-diverse environment.
As schools across the country take in students who have been displaced by the hurricane, there is potential for overcrowding, cross-cultural differences, and conflict. Students get trained and train others in peer mediation and tolerance and then plan and implement a tolerance/peer mediation project to reduce violence in their overcrowded and multi-racial school. Theatre students perform plays to teach peers about bullying, tolerance, and avoiding teen violence.

Education

Colleges nationwide are waiving out-of-state fees and tuition and other admission requirements for displaced students. Students at these colleges can work with displaced students to determine appropriate action. Students may conduct a needs assessment and develop a plan to find housing, tuition assistance, or other needs.
Students may work together to educate peers and younger students about the importance of hurricane preparedness, shared through personal stories.
Raise money not to provide financial assistance to the students to replace their books, school supplies, etc.

Health

Students work with the American Red Cross to organize a blood drive. Students research a suitable location and obtain permission, recruit donors and publicize the drive, and schedule donor appointments. Students could meet with the donors after giving blood to provide snacks, etc.
Students learn CPR and offer training on CPR and preparedness to peers and the community.

Higher Education

Students involved in medical courses may meet curricular goals for clinical courses that include interviewing, physical examination, and clinical reasoning by working alongside health professionals in shelters and community centers. (Read about a similar effort after Hurricane Floyd.)
Teacher education students, specializing in exceptional student education, adapt hurricane preparedness materials for suitability of the learning needs of individuals with cognitive disabilities. They provide direct instruction, assess the safety of homes of the target group, and create take-home kits with disaster preparation information.
Students (high school or HE) involved in medical courses (technical school paramedic courses, pre-med students) may meet curricular goals essential clinical skills that include interviewing, physical examination, clinical reasoning, and working effectively with health care teams and communities by working alongside health professionals in shelters, community centers, etc. (Read about a similar effort was put forth in 2000 after Hurricane Floyd)

Home Renovation

Develop holiday and spring break service-learning initiatives in Louisiana, Mississippi, or Alabama to help rebuild communities. Perhaps partner with Habitat for Humanity.

Intergenerational

Students research, collect items for, assemble, and distribute emergency kits for seniors or other members of the community.
Students develop checklists for seniors, including state and local contacts, family phone numbers, physicians, and instructions for evacuating in an emergency.
Students provide home inspections and assistance to strengthen homes and building code compliance of low-income senior residents.

Literacy

Students design a booklet that includes pictures and word games for children evacuated to a shelter. The booklets, as well as donated books, can be shipped to shelters, schools, and after school centers.
Students can develop an ABC book on starting conversations with individuals who have been affected by hurricanes. Books can be disseminated to schools that are taking in displaced students and/or used to engage students in pen pal programs with students in shelters.
Have a children's book drive and have the books shipped to the various schools to distribute to the children at the schools, after school centers, etc.
Students research and create a book on flooding and water safety during hurricanes and floods.

Science/Environment

Students research the loss of wetlands and development of coastal areas and their impact on communities hit by hurricanes. Students propose and advocate for solutions.
Students create games and books for younger students to learn about hurricanes.
Students conduct home safety audits for seniors and install items to make the homes safer.
Students work with seniors to identify, remove, and dispose of toxic and hazardous home wastes, particularly ones that can poison a home or community during flooding or wind damage.
Students research and contact organizations that can house pets when families are forced to evacuate to shelters that do not allow pets. They develop a checklist for pet owners including information on pet-friendly hotels and shelters as well as food and medical supply needs. Students create and distribute pet emergency kits.
Students create a hurricane safety brochure that is also translated into Spanish and other languages.

There are many free or low-cost resources, curricula, and model programs available. Organizations and programs provide many free materials, and some of the ones we have used in Florida include the following: