The Time to Plan for a Crisis is Before One Happens
Every campus leader hopes the call never comes: a student has died over the weekend, a teacher collapsed in the hallway, or a storm is bearing down during the school day. When it does come, there is no time to figure out who will call the family, what the staff will say to students, or where parents will pick up their children. Weather emergencies do not wait for a convenient time, and neither does the sudden death of a student or staff member.
Your Readiness Checklist:
- Name your teams. Confirm your Campus Crisis Action Team (CCAT) and District Crisis Response Team (DCRT) members, plus a backup for every role.
- Update contact lists. Check phone trees, after-hours numbers, and the district spokesperson’s contact information.
- Assign a family liaison. Decide who will contact a grieving family and how the campus will verify a death before anything is shared.
- Prepare your messages. Have staff scripts, student talking points, and parent letters drafted so you only need to fill in the details.
- Plan reunification. Identify the reunification site, the release log, and how staff will verify the identities of authorized adults.
- Plan for every student. Review supports for students with IEPs, 504 plans, health plans, and communication needs.
- Prepare your counselors. Make sure counselors know how to triage students by exposure, relationship, and personal risk, and that key staff have psychological first aid training.
- Practice. Hold a 45-minute tabletop exercise this semester using a death scenario and a severe weather scenario.
Texas School Procedures has many resources to support Guidelines for Multi-Hazard Emergency Operations and all have been recently updated.
