Education as Part of a Broader National Preparedness System: Part 4

Kathy Francis, Executive Director of the Mid-Atlantic Center for Emergency Management (MACEM) had the pleasure of participating in a panel discussion at the 19th Annual Emergency Management Higher Education Symposium regarding “Education as Part of a Broader National Preparedness System.”

Kathy’s insight is shared in the final installment.

Question 4. Any next steps you are planning in resource development and public, private, and nonprofit leadership development that you would like to share?

I will briefly share three of our most recent efforts.

Beginning in the 2017 fall semester, we are taking an interdisciplinary approach for two of our three-credit classes. We are merging students in the associate of applied science programs of police science, fire science, and emergency management into the Disaster Response and Recovery course and the Emergency Management Ethics and Leadership course. The topic of ethics or the breadth of the topic will increase to about 25-30% of the course learning outcomes.

We are also taking higher education into the community with stackable, flexible contract training options. MACEM EDGE is designed to prepare organizations to identify risk, engage partners, and drive change by integrating analytics, technology, and leadership to build connected communities prepared for the challenges of society today. The custom training blocks are targeted to meet the needs of clients, in their workplace educational setting or online.

The third area is infusing emergency management technologies into content for emergency management personnel and citizens who are, or could be, affected by emergencies. We are looking at forms of technology that benefit each of the following categories: connecting, communicating, and commanding in relation to emergency management. We are taking our own advice and launching a major effort July 1, 2017, as we kickoff content development for an interdisciplinary Geographic Information System (GIS) Academy, which will include credit and noncredit offerings.