With NK and other disruptions in the news, I’ve been thinking more about general preparedness lately.
To be clear, I am not talking about underground bunkers, doomsday end of world stuff, or anything more extreme. I’m interested in how families and schools plan for things like extreme weather, pandemics, riots, or terror attacks. I found an older thread where Deerfield, IIRC, partially closed campus due to H1N1 concerns.
The packing and spending money discussions also made me curious. Do you have a plan for kids far from home? Do they keep some extra stuff in their small rooms? Is it going to seem wacky if I ask a potential school, or is it a common question?
If a student lives more than 200 miles from campus, Choate required some sort of instruction in case of an emergency where campus became unsafe and students needed to be moved. We have many friends in the Boston area, so I recall that we listed and coordinated with one of them in the event of evacuation. Boarding schools have policies and procedures in the event of extreme weather or threats and it’s fine to ask about them. I remember when hurricane Irene hit the east coast just as school was starting our son’s freshman year in 2011 and many of the schools had to deal with the aftermath and water damage. They are prepared for these things, no worries.
Not sure what you’re asking here. Many students live far from home from many states away to many countries away. Our son was over 2,000 miles away from home. He didn’t need any more stuff than a kid who lived 100 miles away. If you’re asking what kids do with their stuff over the summer, there is a service called All Campus Storage that provides boxes/tape/labels/barcodes at the end of school. For a price-per-box, they pick up the boxes, store them over the summer, and deliver them to the student’s new room prior to the start of the following school year. Easy peasy. Also, some students make friends with day students who may offer space in a basement or garage for summer storage.
Thank you @ChoatieMom great information! Hurricane Irene is an excellent example.
I wasn’t thinking quite to the level of gas masks,yikes, more like a really basic “go bag” with say a few Cliff bars, flashlight, water bottle, extra cash, etc. Nothing over the top, but if they did need to leave campus quickly, a few things that would make getting to local contact easier.
When my son has traveled far from home, it has been with wilderness education programs, or adventure camps, so he has already had those items with him.
We are lucky to have several extended family members and friends that live near school and one of them is DC’s local emergency contact. IIRC, if you don’t know someone in the area, the school can match you up with a local family. I imagine many (most?) schools have similar?
Sounds like if it is a concern to you, you should send him with his own bug out bag which he cam stash under his bed or in his closet. Never heard of a BS providing that stuff. But we’re in new territory since January 2017.
@AppleNotFar Pairing with a local family makes sense. We are considering a few schools outside of easy driving distance, so it’s helpful information.
@doschicos I probably will, with instructions not to eat all the Cliff bars the first night at school…haha.
After reading replies, I searched and found a few BS that provide specific disaster planning info on their websites. Also comforting. I remember being at work in Boston on 9-11, and unable to reach my youngest sibling, who was a college freshman at a nearby school. She wasn’t in danger, but her description of how off guard, unprepared and uncertain everyone at her school was stuck with me. (There was a lot of panic, chaos, students moved several times) True for most of us back then, and of course, a lot has changed.
“I probably will, with instructions not to eat all the Cliff bars the first night at school…haha.”
Good luck with that. Send the least tasty flavor.
Our kids’ school was 100% boarding. They did have local families sign up to help with others not local, if needed. Campus had generators and their own power plant. Stuff like that helps in a hurricane, blizzard, etc. - more run of the mill disasters.
Here’s the SPS page for a look at the info they provide. I don’t think it would hurt to ask specific questions but I’d leave out any mention of a zombie apocalypse, which actually got a lot of discussion among my son and his BS classmates - for all kinds of zombies - fast, slow, etc.
Wow @doschicos SPS is very specific, especially with regard to being able to feed the students for 2 weeks. (I’m going to look for kale + lima bean Zombie bars…haha) Absolutely could see my son’s imagination running wild from a few too many PA novels.
2 weeks is reassuring. It’s sensible, and the sort of question I might raise. It’s helpful to know SPS at least fields it often enough to include.
@Periwinkle Our public school option is truly awful, so we homeschool. I know the LPS has lockdown drills, but am not sure what their emergency plans are. We’re in a rural area, and generally close to home for the most part, so I hadn’t given any of this much thought prior to BS entering the picture.
Probably just another moment of understanding the letting go involved if son does move far away for school in a year or two.
@Anthor Without knowing other schools’ plans, one thing that makes SPS somewhat unique is the fact it is 100% boarding and all faculty and their families live on campus as well. In this aspect, it is just as much a small town or village as it is a school.
I would be more concerned about general preparedness – emergency messaging systems, automatic locking doors, drills that prepare students in case of an adverse event, etc.
Our school did have plans (and practices ) for a Newtown type of situation. (The size of most campuses makes this trickier than you might guess!)
After Sandy, they were providing breakfast and showers to day student families as they were much better off in that regard than most of them.
If you’re worried, by all means ask. With that said, I would be very surprised if they didnt have plans. In fact, their insurance carriers may mandate it if common sense does not.
While I don’t know all of the details of PEA’s plans, I can say they have handled several situations very well over the 7 years we have had kids there. We get tornado warning alerts at least once a year and the school notifies us of the precautions they are taking. For major blizzards, many day students and staff stay on campus as they have generators and food. We also have to sign potassium iodide permission forms each year in the event of a nuclear incident as PEA isn’t to far from a nuclear power plant.
