In The News

New Firefighter Courses Developed for S.C. High Schools

June 23, 2014

June 22, 2014, COLUMBIA, S.C. The South Carolina State Firefighters’ Association, the South Carolina Fire Academy and the South Carolina Department of Education announced today that they joined together and have completed new Firefighter I and II programs for the state’s Career and Technology Centers and High Schools as resources for recruiting and training future firefighters. The new programs, which will start in the Fall 2014, will provide real-world training that prepares students for certification testing. “As the number of volunteer firefighters in our state continues to drop to critical levels, career fire departments face the increased challenge of finding qualified applicants,” said Billy Gibson, Chief, Pickens Rural Fire Department and Past President of the SCSFA. “Volunteers are the lifeblood of most of our fire departments here in South Carolina. As young people today, graduate from high school, go off to college, begin their careers, start their families, they face increasingly busy lives and can’t afford the time it takes to train to become a firefighter. We know that if you get high school age students involved early, they most often continue to serve their communities in firefighting.” “We have long been aware the important role our state’s Career and Technology Centers (CTC) and High Schools can play to help fill the impending void of volunteer firefighters by providing valuable resources to help in recruiting and training future firefighters,” said Rick Dunn, Training and Development Director, South Carolina Fire Academy. “This past year we teamed up with several CTC firefighting program instructors to develop a curriculum guide to provide certification-level training for high school-aged students. A three-day Train-the-Trainer Workshop for the CTC and High School instructors is being held June 22-25 during the Education and Business Summit at the TD Convention Center. CTC Instructors will receive didactic and practical skills training by fire service instructors at the Greenville Tech Brashier Campus. The training is being conducted through the cooperative efforts of the South Carolina Fire Academy, local fire service trainers from Anderson and Greenville, and the City of Greenville Fire Department. The new curriculum will be delivered in a new online hybrid format. Students will attend in-person classes but will complete much of the reading and online written assignments as homework which will maximize the time spent practicing hands-on firefighter skills with the instructor during the in-person class sessions. Firefighter I training which requires two semesters includes CPR/first aid, hazardous materials awareness and hazardous materials operations qualifying the students to take a national-level Firefighter I certification exam. Firefighter II training which requires one semester includes basic auto extrication. Additional Saturday skills days may also be required. The course materials for both Firefighter I and II address National Fire Protection Association 1001, Standard for Fire Fighter Professional Qualifications, 2013 Edition. Additional information and assignments have been developed to help fulfill South Carolina Department of Education learning objectives that are relevant to the fire service. Both courses follow International Fire Service Training Association’s Essentials of Fire Fighting, 6^th Edition training manual.

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The South Carolina State Firefighters' Association, based in Columbia and founded in 1905, provides education, training, benefits and representation to the fire departments of South Carolina. For more information go to: www.scfirefighters.org. The South Carolina Fire Academy, located in Columbia, is one of the premier fire-training academies in the United States. The Fire Academy provides emergency services training to the municipal fire service, both paid and volunteers, airport crash rescue departments, industrial fire brigades and emergency teams from around the state and world. The Fire Academy is accredited by the International Fire Service Accreditation Congress. For more information go to: www.scfa.state.sc.us The South Carolina Department of Education’s Career and Technology Centers’ mission is to provide leadership and services to districts and schools supporting grade-level, standards-based curricula through the integration of academic and career and technical instruction for students in grades seven through twelve while focusing on the Office’s 2020 Vision for Career and Technology Education in South Carolina. For more information go to: www.ed.sc.gov/agency/ac/Career-and-Technology-Education/