Public safety agencies increase safety when they engage their communities. Emergency planners can help spread their preparedness message by identifying captive audiences, advice offered by one expert.
The desired impact of having people go out in public is two-fold: Physical presence provides a sense of urgency and importance that is difficult to attain,” according to Robert Avsec, a former Battalion Chief for Chesterfield, Virginia, Fire & EMS.
Ready Girl is a comic book hero and a real emergency planner with the New York City Emergency Management Department (NYC OEM) who does just that. The superhero persona teaches kids about how to stay safe and prepare for disasters with emergency plans and Go Bags.
We all love comic books. What a great concept by @nycemergencymgt and @Marvel They have team up to create a comic book featuring NYC’s emergency preparedness superhero, #ReadyGirl, The Avengers featuring Ready Girl in “Against the Wind.” https://t.co/w2Iof2eZj4#Preparedness pic.twitter.com/bc8306QFH5
— Northants Emergencies (@NorthantsEPTeam) December 28, 2018
Ready Girl, aka Katelyn James, is the youth outreach coordinator for Ready New York. After watching police officers and firefighters present to children at schools, she realized that her youth engagement program could do something more appealing to engage the students, and that’s when she created Ready Girl.
In addition to appearing alongside the Avengers in a real Marvel comic book, Ready Girl teaches kids about what to do in an emergency, like a storm or flood, as part of Ready New York. She brings the preparedness message to schools, like the Paul Klapper School in Flushing, Queens.
In 2018, the NYC OEM and the New York City Department of Education awarded the Ready School of the Year Award to the school’s students and staff.
“If we educate our children at a young age and they share their wealth of knowledge with their friends and family, they will be prepared,” said Sue Greenberg, special events coordinator and special education teacher.
James’s goal as Ready Girl is to inspire youth to be prepared. While teaching kids about preparing a Go Bag is priority for James, she also encourages kids to think about family plans.
What makes her awesome is she is always prepared,” said one city student.
Ready Girl has a blog and makes public appearances to spread the preparedness message with adults too, such as at ComicCon in 2016. Recently on a NYC OEM PrepTalk podcast, she promoted the agency’s Resolve to Be Ready calendar of tips to make it easy for busy adults to prepare for emergencies.
Listen here:
https://soundcloud.com/user-866529970/prep-talk-episode-23-resolve-to-be-ready
