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 | 9-1-1 Public Education December 2006 By Lori Buck
Public Education Works Three steps to jump-start your community education program
This is the final monthly appearance of the 9-1-1 Public Education column. Due to space constraints and the redesign planned for the January issue, the column will no longer appear regularly. Instead, the magazine will include at least two feature articles a year on public education, and I look forward to working on those.
Over the past nine years, it has been fun and an honor to write for APCO and share how public education works and how successful it can be. We’ve shared a lot of information over the years. We’ve discussed how people learn, why they learn and what stops them from learning. We have shared information on successful programs, funding, educational opportunities, where to get materials and even things that I’ve done wrong—such as not calling 9-1-1 when I needed to. Overall, I hope the column has helped promote public education around the country.
In this last monthly column, I want to cover a few of the most important things an agency can do with public education.
Track Your Stats Public education programs need numbers. What are your 9-1-1 statistics, and what are the problem calls you need to address? For 9-1-1 centers, numbers are the easiest evaluator for your programs. Ask your operators what citizen problems they deal with daily. When you have that information, develop messages about your center. Make sure you share the messages with your agency so everyone can buy into them. Have specific information about call statistics before you start your educational outreach, and track where your numbers go as you implement your programs. If they stop rising or go down, that indicates success. Keep it up.
Find the Right Program You need a program: You can use readymade programs, such as the Red E. Fox program, or you can create your own, like I did. I created messages, assigned an age range and developed an outline for each message and age range.
In my preschool programs, I teach the children what an emergency is, as well as who and how to call for help. The children are introduced to cell phones and, depending on their age and development, I also have them show me how to call 9-1-1-Send on a toy cell phone. I carry a variety of cell phones and ask the teachers to assist me in having the children find the “send” key on the phones. This helps the children understand that cell phones differ from their home phones.
I also created a storybook and a coloring book about 9-1-1 and cell phones. You can download the free books from www.pinellascounty.org/911/colorforms.htm and customize them with your agency name. In the near future, a storybook and a coloring book about calling 9-1-1 on a home phone will also be available. The books will include information on when and when not to call 9-1-1, as well as E9-1-1 information.
Other ideas to get the message out to your community: Tell someone your message, and ask them to tell someone else and so on. You can do a press release or mail an informational letter. Look for events in your local paper and ask the organizers if you can set up a table.
Displays at such events are fun, and you can use simple materials to draw people to your booth. I use a red cloth as a table cover and put a few burned phones on it. The phones serve as a strong visual aid to alert people to the need to get out of their house if there’s a fire before calling 9-1-1. I also have cell phones and home phones available for kids to practice with. I print my messages and mount them on foamcore for additional visual aids. My handouts—which include the local nonemergency numbers for police, fire and medical, power companies, animal control and the jail—are on the table for people to take. This helps reduce the number of nonemergency calls to 9-1-1, because people post these numbers and don’t have to work to look them up. I also have Frisbees, coloring books, wristbands, stickers, totebags, pencils, pens, cell phone holders and more to give away. I usually give out only one really good (read: pricey) item at a time, to make my supplies last.
You can do a lot with your programs and often for little money. Copies of one coloring page from the download mentioned above can serve as an inexpensive, fun handout. You can also take pictures of your center and enlarge them for display at your table.
The better your program, the more word of mouth you’ll get. You’ll stay as busy as you want to be. I schedule a year in advance, but still have to turn down requests. So I do very little marketing right now except try to call at least one new contact a week to see if they want a program from 9-1-1.
Check for Progress After all the fun, don’t forget to evaluate your program efforts and report your findings to your supervisors. Public education works—and works well when targeted, specific and age appropriate. Don’t wait to get started. Remember to network around your area if you need help, or e-mail me at ed911@aol.com.
I’ve enjoyed talking to you each month and look forward to sharing more on public education later next year.
Lori Buck is the education coordinator for Pinellas County (Fla.) 911. Contact her at 727/464-3858 or at ed911@aol.com.
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