Pack Emergency Preparedness and Crime Prevention Program

As a Tiger, my son was all about police and firefighters (well, mainly their vehicles), so I looked for opportunities to allow him to explore those careers while a Cub Scout. We did the Tiger Safe and Smart, but I felt that there had to be a little more he could do. Having formerly been a Red Cross instructor myself, and already being a certified disaster responder for several national and local agencies, I was excited when I ran across the BSA Emergency Preparedness and Crime Prevention awards.

My son was the only Cub in his pack to earn those awards last year, and as part of my den year planning, I included them as items we would do with the entire Wolf den this year. However, I invited other dens to participate in my Den Saturday activity, so I ended up structuring the program to meet all the requirements for Tigers, Wolves and Bears.

Now, a couple of notes:

Some items will have to be completed at home, either before or after, for a Cub to meet all requirements. I made this easy by making specific worksheets that could be signed off by the parent, the den leader, and then myself at the actual event day.
The Crime Prevention award is a retired award by BSA, however, it is still available to be earned by certain councils, one of which is mine. You will need to check in advance before offering this to your Cubs. The Crime Prevention award also requires a separate community service project (my son and I cleaned up a local playground last year for it).
If you are interested, adult leaders can also earn the BSA Emergency Preparedness award. There are obviously different requirements, but something you can do to demonstrate to your Cubs the importance of these skills. I did this last year while working on the award with my son.
There is also a Unit Award for the BSA Emergency Preparedness award, given if a certain percentage of your unit achieves the award. It requires participation by adult leaders as well.

Step 1: Commit to doing the program.

There are a lot of requirements to be met, and they can vary from den to den, so read through and itemize out what is needed. Lucky for you, I already did that, so you can download my worksheets for cheat sheets (links will be at the bottom of this post). Also, make the parents and other den leaders commit. This program took a lot to put together, so I made parents/den leaders sign up and RSVP to participate. It’s important to have an accurate head count, and we should not feel guilty asking to folks to be accountable.

Step 2: Get help from community partners.

We have a great relationship with our local public safety departments. In fact, they work the carpool line at our elementary school every morning, so most of them already know our Cubs. Using the work I did in Step 1, I sent an email and outlined what I needed for each department to cover for the boys to meet their requirements:

Police Department

Finger print ID kits (one for each Cub).
Bicycle riding laws.
Safety tips for at home and out in the community.
What is a neighborhood watch.
Any tips for bullying, how to deal with.
Settle arguments with words, not fists or weapons.

EMT

Plan and practice summoning help during an emergency.
Learn emergency skills and care for choking, wounds, nosebleeds, falls, and animal bites. The emergency skills should include responses for fire safety, poisoning, water accidents, substance abuse, and more.

Fire Dept

How to stop, drop and roll.
Show you know how to safely roll someone else in a blanket to put out a fire.
Practice a fire drill.
How to test and check smoke detectors.
Learn emergency skills/responses for fire safety.

Emergency Management Agency

Hurricane and tornado preparedness

Step 3: Get your materials together.

Back over the summer, the Scout Shop online ran the Power Pack Pals comics on sale for 25 cents a piece. I didn’t have a plan for them, but figured they would be a useful tool. The comics touched on topics for bullying and personal safety. I bought 15 of each just to have and now they are coming in handy. I also went through the list of requirements for these awards and searched the internet for PDFs, coloring pages, activity pages, etc. on the topics that could be created into a workbook. (Because of the number of months I’ve worked on this, I don’t have every single link, but I included some at the bottom of this blog.) I also created a sheet about the Cub Scout Six Essentials, and included the page to draw a fire escape plan from the Safe Kids organization.

If you’ve tried to do this before, you’ll notice that the BSA requirements reference a program, First Aid Today for Kids, that is no longer offered by the Red Cross. I reached out to my local chapter to see if they had old books available, and though they didn’t, they did have the somewhat newer disaster preparedness books that they partnered one with Disney, and set some of those aside for me.

I’m also attempting to complete the Rolling Tigers elective requirement as our community has a foundation dedicated to keeping children in helmets. (Update 1/10/18: As our group for this program is small (10 Cubs), the foundation granted my request, which means each of our participants will also be receiving a free helmet for bike safety. Since they had a conflicting event on the same day, they are preparing the helmets and safety take aways for me to pick up and distribute at our program.)

Knowing that having some visual aids would be helpful, I also posted on my Facebook page if any of my business friends had mini first aid kits they give away that they would be willing to donate. There are lots of ways you can make a first aid kit, and you can purchase many supplies cheaply, but I was looking for a shortcut on time and my budget. I’ll post back on how that turned out. (Update 1/10/18: A friend with a local hospital’s marketing department was able to put some items together for me – a Scout is thrifty!)

Step 4: Putting it all together.

This program has taken months for me to put together. It’s four days away and I’m just now printing everything out. I imagine I’ll be up late Friday night putting the binders together (I made individual covers for each one with the Cub’s name and rank on them so they can tell them apart).

Check back in to find out how it went!

Links and PDFs

Award Applications (turned in to Council to get your awards):
BSA Emergency Preparedness
Crime Prevention

Links