PHOTO BY MICHAEL SAFETY FIRST DAVIS South Tama County Middle School students recently participated in an evacuation drill that led them to the Wieting Theater in Toledo.

Fire drills, lockdown drills, inclement weather drills, shelter in place drills, and now evacuation drills are practiced at the South Tama County schools. School Resource Officer Vern Jefferson explained the evacuation drill.

“Examples for an evacuation could be a fire, gas leak and/or any safety threat when the building is not able to be reentered. This is our first drill where staff and students relocated to another location.”

Students and staff evacuated the middle school and walked to the Wieting Theater to regroup. Communication is key in situations of exigency, as SRO Jefferson explained.

“The CrisisGo App was also used to communicate the drill. The CrisisGo is an app used to communicate emergency situations to staff; it also allows teachers to take attendance of their students for accountability purposes,” he said.

Once at the Wieting Theater, Toledo Police Chief Dan Quigley spoke to the students about law enforcement expectations and the importance of following officers’ instructions when they arrived on the scene of an emergency.

This was the first evacuation and reunification drill for South Tama, but it is far from the last. Another level of preparedness and security is added to keep the children of STC safe.