Albert W. Schlick III: Required Training: A Guide for the Training Officer

By Albert W. Schlick III

The modern fire service is a rapidly evolving and increasingly demanding service, and there has never been a more challenging time to be a training officer. From the changes in building materials and contents to the real science being applied to fire suppression, the status quo has never been more dangerous. The training officers must be on the cutting edge of modern fire service practices with one eye fixed on the future to ensure they are not left behind by the challenges ahead. Fortunately, there are a myriad of helpful fire training resources on the Internet. However, like anything found on the Internet, we need to be vigilant and thoroughly vet the information before presenting it to our members. Firefighter-produced training sites are good sources of information. Many of them focus on a single fireground function and are great resources for information and training materials pertaining to the function. From forcible entry to hoseline management, these sites are outstanding and help the training officer stay ahead of the learning curve.

Of the many sources of training information, there isn’t a single one that addresses standards and mandatory training–mostly because standards are confusing and open to interpretation. The list of required training is long and tedious to decipher, but it is filled with helpful information and directions for the training officer. It has become popular in the fire service to poke fun at the many required training topics and the associations/agencies that mandate them. I think we can all agree that theses mandatory subjects are less than exciting, but they exist because someone lost his health or life because of a lack of training in that area.

If we ignore the required subjects, there is a chance that they may never cause our members any harm. However, if one of our folks were injured or killed because we “chose” not to train on a topic that led to the injury or death, the repercussions would reach far and wide.  Any department that has experienced a line-of-duty death will testify that the lingering effects and the second-guessing are often unbearable and sometimes cannot be overcome. When determining what the mandatory subjects are, the training officer need only look as far as the state’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), and the Insurance Services Office (ISO).

OSHA

Before taking any action, the training officer must understand the relationship between the state and the U.S. Department of Labor. OSHA, an arm of the U.S. Department of Labor was created by Congress with the Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act of 1970. OSHA’s mission is to ensure safe and healthy working conditions by setting and enforcing standards and providing training, outreach, education, and assistance.  All states have a department charged with worker health and safety. The OSH Act covers most private-sector employers and their workers in addition to some public-sector employers and their workers in the 50 states and certain territories and jurisdictions under federal authority. Workers at state and local government agencies are not covered by federal OSHA, but they have OSH Act protections if they work in those states that have an OSHA-approved state plan. OSHA rules also permit states and territories to develop plans that cover only public-sector (state and local government) workers. In these cases, private-sector workers and employers remain under federal OSHA jurisdiction.

Currently, only four additional states and one U.S. territory have OSHA-approved state plans that cover public-sector workers only. State plans are OSHA approved job safety and health programs operated by individual states instead of federal OSHA. Section 18 of the OSH Act encourages states to develop and operate their own job safety and health programs and precludes state enforcement of OSHA standards unless the state has an OSHA-approved program. OSHA approves and monitors all state plans and provides as much as 50 percent of the funding for each program.

What is more interesting is that those states that develop and manage their own safety and health programs are required by OSHA to be at least as effective (ALAE) as the federal OSHA program. The lesson in all of this is that using the federal OSHA guidelines is always a safe place to start when trying to determine what is required.

NFPA

The NFPA is an international nonprofit organization established in 1896. Its mission is to reduce the worldwide burden of fire and other hazards on the quality of life by providing and advocating consensus codes and standards, research, training, and education. NFPA publishes 300 codes and standards designed to minimize the risk and effects of fire by establishing criteria for building, processing, design, service, and installation in the United States as well as many other countries. Virtually every building, process, service, design, and installation in society today is affected by NFPA documents. Its codes and standards, administered by more than 250 technical committees comprising approximately 8000 volunteers, are adopted and used throughout the world. These volunteers come from the fire service and associated agencies and companies. The standards produced are known as consensus standards and are not laws.  However, they are viewed as our industry’s “best practices,” and fire departments are measured against them in matters of compliance. Some folks will suggest that these standards are not applicable to a fire department that does not adopt them; this is not the case. As the industry’s best practices, they are used as guides when scrutinizing all fire departments.

Another popular misconception is that NFPA standards are created and manipulated by manufacturers who are using the standards to sell their wares. Although manufacturers and other groups associated with the fire service can have a seat at the table, the majority of these standards are created “by firefighters for firefighters.” It is not clear why some in our business are afraid of these standards, but those who embrace them find that they provide the training officer and the whole fire department with a clear and concise path to follow.

ISO

ISO is a leading source of information about property/casualty insurance risk. Through a system known as the Public Protection Classification (PPC™) program, ISO evaluates municipal fire protection efforts in communities throughout the United States. A community’s investment in fire mitigation is a proven and reliable predictor of future fire losses. Insurance companies use PPC information to help establish fair premiums for fire insurance, generally offering lower premiums in communities with better protection. Many communities use the PPC as a benchmark for measuring the effectiveness of their fire protection services as well as a tool to plan for, budget, and justify improvements.

The Fire Suppression Rating Schedule (FSRS) is the backbone of the PPC™. This is a manual containing the criteria ISO uses to review the fire prevention and fire suppression capabilities of individual communities or fire protection areas. The schedule measures the major elements of a community’s fire protection system and develops a numerical grading. The FSRS considers three main areas of a community’s fire suppression system: emergency communications, fire department (including operational considerations), and water supply.

In the section on the fire department, the training officer can find all the required training events needed for a perfect score in that section. Although some will disregard the impact that ISO has on our communities, this is an opportunity for the fire department to save the taxpayer some money.

Additionally, the training that is evaluated is based on fire suppression activities, which is the reason we have fire departments in the first place. Of all the agencies that mandate training, the ISO is by far the easiest to support, and its requirements are also easy to achieve.

Every person who has ever been assigned to the training office knows the lonely feeling that comes with not knowing with any certainty what is required to be covered on a yearly basis.  There is no greater feeling than finding something that provides direction, performance measures, and a means to evaluate your efforts. These three agencies take more grief from the fire service but continue to give so much. They are not perfect or all encompassing, and the training officers still have a lot of work ahead of them. However, once the mandatory topics are out of the way, the must-know topics developed locally kick in, and the training officers find their comfort zone.  For the most part, the fire department training officers know what skills and knowledge are necessary and beneficial to their departments. Using the mandatory topics as a starting point and the guidance provided by the three agencies helps the training officer’s job become more pleasurable. Training officers need not feel alone as long as they are willing to accept the mandatory topics and the guidance provided.

References

1.                  https://www.osha.gov/about.html.

2.                  http://www.nfpa.org/about-nfpa.

3.                  http://www.isomitigation.com/docs/about0001.html.

BIO

Albert W. Schlick III is a division chief with the Wauconda (IL) Fire District and is assigned as the director of training. He is a past president of the Illinois Society of Fire Service Instructors and served on the Board for eight years. He has a Chief Training Officer Designation from the Center for Public Safety Excellence and has a bachelor’s degree in workforce education and development as well as a master’s degree in education. He is the co-host of The Training Office, the official show of the International Society of Fire Service Instructors, on Fire Engineering Blog Talk Radio.

 

 

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