{"id":1318678,"date":"2020-03-11T17:01:12","date_gmt":"2020-03-11T23:01:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/?p=994505"},"modified":"2020-03-11T17:01:12","modified_gmt":"2020-03-11T23:01:12","slug":"rifle-high-school-students-prepare-for-the-unexpected","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/rifle-high-school-students-prepare-for-the-unexpected\/","title":{"rendered":"Rifle High School students prepare for the unexpected"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Students from Rifle High School remove simulated victims from a building during a drill last week at Colorado River Fire Rescue Station 41. Eighteen students from RHS spent the last five-weeks going through the MyPI course organized by the RIfle Police Department, Garfield County CSU Extension.<\/strong>
<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Students from Rifle High School showed no hesitation running into a simulated disaster Friday at Colorado River Fire Rescue Station 41. <\/p>\n

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The second group of Rifle High School students rush to the scene of the simulated accident as Sergeant Wilson briefs them on the scenario.<\/strong>
RifleMyPI-rct-031220-3<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

The event organized by the Rifle Police Department, Garfield County CSU Extension, Colorado River Fire Rescue, and Garfield County Emergency Management is part of a state and national program offering training and certification to youth.<\/p>\n

Eighteen students took part in the five-week MyPI National Youth Preparedness Initiative program that culminated in Rifle.<\/p>\n

MyPI, which stands for My Preparedness initiative, provides a challenging youth preparedness and leadership development opportunity in which teenagers are empowered to take ownership of their preparedness and to assist their families and surround communities with the same.<\/p>\n

There are three components, the first trains students in Department of Homeland Security\/Federal Emergency Management Agency-certified CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) training and corresponding modules focusing on disaster preparedness, fire safety and utility control, disaster medical operations, light search and rescue, CERT organization, disaster psychology, and terrorism and CERT.<\/p>\n

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Students help simulated victims as the assess the scene of the drill last Friday.<\/strong>
RifleMyPI-rct-031220-3<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

The program also includes certification in first aid, CPR, and AED usage, along with a technology track comprised of awareness programs focusing on HAM Radio, NOAA weather radio, smoke alarm maintenance, and smart phone app and social media in emergency preparedness.  <\/p>\n

The final element of the program includes a comprehensive family and community service project entitled \u201cPrep + 6\u201d in which each participant helps develop emergency supply kits and emergency communication plans for their family AND 6 additional families in the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t be happier of how it turned out. These young men and women were put to the test,\u201d Rifle Police Sgt. and Emergency manager Kirk Wilson said.<\/p>\n

The scenario involved multiple victims after a car had collided with a building.<\/p>\n

Split into two groups the students used the training that they have been taught over the last five weeks to help assess, treat and remove victims from the scene. <\/p>\n

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Stephanie Straw, Rifle Police Student Resource officer, hands Rifle High School senior Nicholas Heil a hard hat as he takes the role of incident commander during last Friday\u2019s simulation.<\/strong>
RifleMyPI-rct-031220-1<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cIt was definitely a good experience putting on the skills together that we\u2019ve been learning into a real scenario like this,\u201d Rifle High School senior and group one incident commander Nicholas Heil said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI Felt like my team was able to respond very well, and we were really efficient in being able to sweep through the building using the skills we learned with search and rescue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rifle High School junior Karely Salazar said the simulation was pretty intense \u2014 and hard. <\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t know what to do at times, but the team really helped. \u201cI think it is important to be prepared for emergencies, and I think this program has helped me be more prepared and trained.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Karely Salazar, a junior at Rifle High School, tends to an injured victim after she was removed from the simulated burning building after a car crashed into it.<\/strong>
RifleMyPI-rct-031220-6<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Wilson found out about the program during a trip to the Colorado Emergency Manager conference in Loveland last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWade Ingle, the head of the MyPI Colorado program and CSU extension specialist gave a presentation about it and I was very interested in it,\u201d Wilson said.<\/p>\n

I love high school stuff, classes, and interaction in education. I saw this as a way of teaching a valuable class and teaching these kids some incredible life saving skills.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the skills learned in the class, Wilson said, \u201cThey can go out in the community and make the difference, and truly affect the community far better than I as a single emergency manager would ever be able to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilson recruited Kaycee Manuppella, the 4-H STEM School Enrichment & After-School Agent with CSU Extension, Garfield County to help out with the program.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve dedicated six Fridays of their time voluntarily to come and do this,\u201d Manuppella said.<\/p>\n

Manuppella and Rifle Police Department School Resource Officer Stephaine Straw both attended CERT and MyPI training and certification in Denver last December.<\/p>\n

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Venee Kuhns, a junior at Rifle High School, performs CPR on one of the simulated victims during last Saturday\u2019s disaster drill.<\/strong>
RifleMyPI-rct-031220-5<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cI think that it builds their confidence and gives them the ability to respond in any situation, that could be an accident, a disaster, or a traumatic event,\u201d Straw said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt also gives them an outlook of different things they can do in their future, opens doors for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

As part of the program\u2019s \u201cPrep + 6\u201d the students had to go out in the community and recruit families to sign up and learn about the program from the individual students. <\/p>\n

Each students had to educate theirs and six others families the skills and preparedness they had learned over the five week class.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis model they chose to do, I\u2019m really impressed with their presentation skills and the fortitude to stand there and talk to adults they might not have met before,\u201d Manuppella said.<\/p>\n

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Members of the first group of students to go through the simulation watch the second group take their turn last Friday at CRFR Station 41.<\/strong>
RifleMyPI-rct-031220-10<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

With the students\u2019s help, the program registered 122 families.<\/p>\n

Manuppella said the hope is by the time they are done they will each have seven letters of commitment from families that are agreeing to take on the responsibility of preparing their family.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve really enjoyed going out into the community and showing people stuff I\u2019ve learned in case of emergencies and giving them stuff to help with it,\u201d Rifle High School junior Venee Kuhns said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was really cool because I was able to teach them what I\u2019ve learned, show them what to do in case of an emergency, and make me feel good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rifle Police Department, Garfield County CSU Extension and Rifle High School are inviting community members and representatives to a graduation ceremony they will host from 9:30-11 a.m., Friday at the Garfield County Fairgrounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot only are these young people becoming first responders within their own households; they have each educated and helped prepare at least six additional families through training and delivery of a basic preparedness kit,\u201d Manuppella said according to a release. \u201cThis group of Rifle High School students has dedicated their own out-of-school time, attending training during the last five Fridays and participating in community outreach events in addition.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilson said the key part to the program is the \u201cPrep + 6\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen everything is said and done roughly five percent of the population of our community will have had disaster preparedness training and also have a disaster preparedness kit, which is amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

kmills@postindependent.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Students from Rifle High School remove simulated victims from a building during a drill last week at Colorado River Fire Rescue Station 41. Eighteen students from RHS spent the last five-weeks going through the MyPI course organized by the RIfle Police Department, Garfield County CSU Extension. Students from Rifle High School showed no hesitation running […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1318678","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-25 18:14:56","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1318678","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1318678"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1318678\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1318678"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1318678"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1318678"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}