Director of Disaster Management Jasen Penn’s Message on International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction: SMART Schools help empower the next generation for a resilient future
It is once again the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction, or DRR Day. Each year, disaster managers like myself share new developments in the field of disaster management, highlight strategies and actions individuals can take to reduce their personal risk, and advocate for improved disaster management practices around the world.
This year’s theme is “Empowering the next generation for a resilient future.” Youth and school resilience is a topic near and dear to those of us in the Department of Disaster Management, which is why 20 years ago, we partnered with the Ministry of Education on a School Safety project targeting fire and disaster safety.
Since then, our partnership developed into the Safe School programme, and later, with the inclusion of green principles like environmental conservation, the SMART Schools programme.
Along the way, we have supported the Ministry of Education’s efforts to incorporate disaster risk reduction throughout the school system – partnering to create individual school safety plan templates, conduct regular emergency drills, and draft a Comprehensive Continuity of Education Plan. Educators and administrators have embraced the concept of disaster risk reduction, incorporating weather and hazard education into their curriculum in age appropriate ways.
More recently, BVI’s SMART Schools concept has earned the interest and trust of additional partners like the H. Lavity Stoutt Community College, the BVI Red Cross and Green VI. Their partnership, supported by the EU’s Resilience, Sustainable Energy, and Marine Biodiversity (RESEMBID) programme, has expanded our capacity and will soon allow us to certify the largest batch yet of Safe and SMART Schools in the Virgin Islands.
Today, I can ask a child as young as six or seven in the Virgin Islands what they should do in case of an earthquake or a tsunami or a hurricane, and chances are, that child will tell me!
Around the world, climate change is making us all more vulnerable to serious hazards. I find it gratifying that the youngsters who will lead this Territory in the future, have grown up with a solid foundation of what it means to be truly resilient.
