Welcome to IAAI’s October 2009 CFITrainer.Net Podcast. This month’s podcast is devoted to Fire Prevention Week, which is October 4-10, 2009.

Fire Prevention Week is an excellent opportunity for fire investigators to be involved in a community education effort that helps save lives. Every day, fire investigators see firsthand how fires are caused, how they spread, and what the consequences are of poor fire safety practices. Thus, investigators are in a great position to bring this knowledge to the community. Not only will the education protect the public, but it will also save firefighter lives by helping reduce the incidence of fires.

Because of the grassroots nature of this effort, the types of events that can be done on the local level are limited only by the imagination. Ideas for Fire Prevention Week activities include an open house at the fire department, "ask the investigator" classroom or assembly visits at schools and PTA meetings, a community-wide fire drill, smoke alarm installation seminars, “stop drop and roll” lessons, interviews and op/ed pieces with local media (including television, newspaper, radio, and Internet), and distribution of fire prevention brochures and flyers at key community locations such as the post office or grocery store. Free resources to support all these activities are available from the National Fire Protection Association on the firepreventionweek.org web site. Updates are also announced via Twitter, where you can follow twitter.com/FPW2009.

Other free Fire Prevention Week ideas and resources are available online from these sources:

• FireSafety.gov offers planning resources for adults; coloring pages, puzzles, and games that teach kids how to stay safe from fire; and media packages to help get local stations and newspapers to cover the issue.



• SafeTBear.org from the Delaware Valley Firemen’s Association offers a free DVD suitable for children ages 2-10 that uses animated characters to teach how to plan for and escape from a fire at home.



• USFA offers a variety of Fire Safety resources for adults, kids, teachers, and parents. They also have resources aimed at populations with special needs, including older adults, people with disabilities, and college students. These special needs resources can support fire investigators in reaching out to these groups with information that addresses their specific situations. In addition, USFA resources support targeted topics like fireworks, smoke alarms, fire extinguishers, and carbon monoxide.



• interFIRE.org provides "Get Out Safely! A Teaching Tool in Support of Fire Prevention," which is a lesson plan for how to teach fire prevention using the virtual reality scene in interFIRE VR. The resource is available at http://www.interfire.org/features/nfpw.asp



• Scholastic also focuses on providing lesson plans for K-5 teachers to do fire prevention activities in the classroom. These resources can be provided by the fire investigator to local teachers, or used in conjunction with teachers as the basis for the fire investigator’s visit to the classroom. Visit scholastic.com/firesafety for access to the free lesson plans.



• BeFireSmart.com from Liberty Mutual offers a free, streaming series of videos starring famous people and other resources that teach key concepts in fire prevention and safety. And finally.



• SafeSleep.org focuses on bedroom fire safety.

A recent news story underscores how crucial it is to keep up the fire safety and prevention effort. A new national survey from Underwriters Laboratories on children’s choices in a fire emergency found that although more than 90% of children said they would know exactly what to do in a fire emergency, only 47% correctly chose getting out of the building immediately as their first response to a fire. This finding demonstrates that it is critical to reinforce intellectual learning with physical practice that aims to ingrain the proper response as the reflex reaction. Through continual reinforcement and practice, more children will make good choices when confronted with the confusion and fear of a real fire emergency.

Finally, as we do each month, we’ll close with the news from the IAAI.

The Fire Investigation Technician professional designation program is underway with testing now available. Applications can be found on the IAAI website, firearson.com.

This year’s Advanced Arson Investigative Techniques for the Insurance Industry Class offered by IAAI is fully booked. If you want to make a reservation, you can be placed on a waiting list which will be carried over to next year’s class enrollment. Contact IAAI to be placed on the waiting list.

Opportunities for IAAI members to be listed in the new IAAI Speaker’s Bureau can be found in the member’s only section of the firearson.com.

That concludes this IAAI CFITrainer.Net podcast. Remember to participate in National Fire Prevention Week from October 4-10, this year and make a difference in your community. We’ll see you again next month.