NCBRT Delivering Timely Mobile Training Tailored to Meet the Needs of Communities Across the Nation
April 24, 2017
The National Center for Biomedical Research and Training, located at Louisiana State University, is creating a culture of preparedness across the nation with its timely training. This year has already taken off, with new courses, full schedules and a national reach.
NCBRT's newest courses are Critical Decision Making for Complex Coordinated Attacks, or CCA, and Active Threat Integrated Response Course, or ATIRC. While the CCA course lays the groundwork for responders across jurisdictions to mobilize quickly during a crisis, ATIRC is designed to improve integration between law enforcement, fire, and emergency medical services in active shooter events.
The State of New Jersey has already scheduled 31 classes in 2017, including several CCA classes and two ATIRC classes. Because the state is making guidelines for the rescue task force standard operating procedures, they also scheduled the Readiness: Training Identification and Preparedness Planning, or RTIPP course, which teaches participants how to create effective training plans for their agencies and jurisdictions.
Several of NCBRT's courses flow so well into each other that there may be a suite of courses offered together next year. "We realized the CCA course flows well into the LASER course, which flows well into ATIRC," said NCBRT Regional Training Manager Garrett Zollinger.
LASER is the Law Enforcement Active Shooter Emergency Response course, which addresses technical aspects of planning and implementing a rapid law enforcement deployment to an active shooter incident. This course, or similar training, has unfortunately become a necessity for law enforcement agencies around the nation.
From New Jersey on the northeast coast to Alaska in the far northwest, NCBRT is busy providing training. The Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management hosted the Law Enforcement Prevention & Deterrence of Terrorist Acts course to help fill the training gaps identified in the 2016 Alaska Assessment at their 2017 spring conference in Anchorage.
NCBRT is also providing lots training in the heartland this year. The State of Kentucky is participating in an RTIPP initiative, in which 11 RTIPP courses will be delivered this year. Each RTIPP delivery will be compiled of three different neighboring counties or jurisdictions, and the training will be customized for those specific counties and jurisdictions. There will be 15 participants per county, so all response agencies will be represented.
Don Franklin, with Kentucky Emergency Management, stresses the importance of the RTIPP course. "The information provided in this class will affect how well your county will be prepared to develop adequate plans based upon your submitted THIRA, the responsibilities of the planning group, and the actual response plan that is written," says Franklin.
In addition to providing states with preparedness training, NCBRT is working with tribal nations to deliver relevant training to their communities. The center has enlisted the help of Robert Holden and Steve Golubic as NCBRT Tribal Program Advisors.
"Tribes are limited in funding and the number of employees available to send to training. Most training is off-site and is cost prohibitive for tribes to attend. Some tribes are proficient in emergency management planning and capability. For those tribes lacking capacity, there are reasons for their circumstances including, historical, disparate funding, and other factual explanations. NCBRT management understands these challenges and we all plan to work to change the situation," said Holden.
"NCBRT has developed a comprehensive training program to meet some of the needs in tribal nations. Since all NCBRT training is mobile, this takes away a major challenge for tribes. Additionally, NCBRT training is provided at no additional costs to tribes making these opportunities much less of an impact to tribal budgets. Tribal officials seem receptive to our collective efforts so far," added Golubic.
Three NCBRT courses, Biological Incidents Awareness; Site Protection Through Observational Techniques; and Law Enforcement Prevention and Deterrence of Terrorist Acts, Customized will be provided at the Inter-Tribal Emergency Management Coalition Summit in Catoosa, OK June 15.
"This is an exciting time for NCBRT. We are fulfilling our mission to provide preparedness training to communities across the nation while ensuring the classes are tailored to the needs of those individual communities," said NCBRT Operations and Plans Associate Director Jason Krause.
"Additionally, we are more efficient than ever. We trained 37 percent more participants in 2016 than 2015, and we anticipate raising that number even higher this year," continued Krause.