At home fire drills added to virtual school requirements

Lirpa Loof

District officials have grown concerned about students learning from home who have gone over a year without a fire drill. They will now have to vacate their homes when the fire bell rings.

Safety is every school’s number 1 priority. After all, they are responsible for every student while school is in session. In order to improve at home safety, the district will pass a motion that requires all students attending virtually to stand in their driveways for fire drills.

Every time there is a fire drill at the school, teachers will dress up in fire suits and ride around blaring alarms and bells from the top of fire trucks. At this point all students will be required to shut off the lights, lock their house, walk outside in a single file line, and stand outside at the assigned location for their house.

The administration believes that this is the best thing they could do to make sure students know what to do if they get a fire in their home classroom. The law says that fire drills have to be practiced in all schools and they believe it should apply at home to. Students will also have assigned spots on their property to ensure distancing and be required to wear masks.

“With so many of our students learning from home each day, we realized that many did not realize that fire safety is just as important at home as it is in school. Our laws mandate that all students evacuate buildings during a fire drill and I don’t know why that would be any different if you are learning virtually from home. Just because students are at home doesn’t mean we don’t have the responsibility to ensure their safety should there be a fire,” Nicholson said. “We just want to make sure that our students at home practice social distancing during all drills so please make sure you are masked and stay at least 6 feet away from any neighbors that may be outside during the drill.”

For all students who decide that they do not want to comply with the new demands during an at home fire drill, there will be steps taken against you. First, the district will send a team of newly hired employees to the student’s door and they will shake the knob and pound on the door. If you still refuse to come out, then they will break into the student’s home. Finally, if they still refuse to come out, the student will be expelled from the school.

Ensuring the safety of every student is the most important thing to the district and they believe that this is one step in the right direction towards that goal.