In The News.
April 27, 2007
by Sandia Lab News
Even as the nation was still recoiling from the murderous violence that claimed the lives of more than 30 students and faculty at the Virginia Tech campus and left dozens more injured, high school students from New Mexico, Arizona, and California gathered in Albuquerque for the inaugural High School Homeland Security Conference.
The April 20-22 conference, hosted by Sandia, was held at the AmeriSuites Hotel. It was preceded by a kickoff dinner and reception at the National Atomic Museum, where Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chavez welcomed the participants. Sandia Deputy Labs Director and Sr. VP Al Romig also addressed the students. The conference also included a tour of Sandia's Homeland Security facilities and a presentation by Bernalillo County Sheriff Darren White.
Conference organizer John Taylor, manager of ITS Strategic Office Dept. 303, says that while the agenda for the conference didn’t include specific reference to the Virginia Tech rampage, the scenario-based program asked students to develop ways to deal with a hypothetical disruptive situation in their own communities.
The High School Homeland Security Program was started in 2005 by John and Needles, Calif., high school teacher Lyn Parker. (John is a native of Needles and has maintained close ties with Needles High School over the years).
Basic principles of homeland security
The program, John says, is designed to enhance the critical thinking skills of high school students and to develop their understanding of the basic principles of homeland security and emergency preparedness. Since the program’s inception, participants have been asked to plan for major terrorist incidents, industrial accidents, and natural disasters in their home communities. As a culmination of that planning, students then are presented with a full-scale event in which they must exercise their skills while working through complex emergency situations in near-real time.
“The conference was successful beyond my wildest dreams,” says John. “The enthusiasm of the 41 students and 5 faculty advisors was obvious and palpable; you could actually see the learning and critical thinking skills improve as the students shared their experiences and worked together to resolve questions and solve the new problem they were given on Sunday. In light of the negative publicity given to students these days, this was a definite exception.”
Conference attendees came from Needles High School in Needles, Calif., River Valley High School in Mohave Valley, Arizona, the Livermore Valley Homeschool Coalition, and the Southwest Learning Centers charter school in Albuquerque.
After being briefed about the program last year, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense Paul McHale said, “This program should be a part of the curriculum in every high school in the country.” John says that with appropriate resources, the program is readily expandable to other high schools.
The program is sponsored by the International Technologies & Systems Strategic Management Group and the Sandia Homeland Security and Defense Strategic Management Unit.
Posted May 03, 2007