September is Emergency Preparedness month.  It is time to create or revise your emergency preparedness plan to include the lessons learned during COVID and become prepared for a natural or human caused disaster during COVID.  Would you respond differently during a pandemic if you had to evacuate your house due to fire?  Would you stay in a shelter?  Would you stay in a hotel?  Would you camp?  Any of these responses require a level of preparedness we have not thought about in the past.  Here is how you can plan for a natural disaster during COVID:  https://www.cdc.gov/disasters/hurricanes/covid-19/public-disaster-shelter-during-covid.html

Emergency Plans

We all must have our individual/family plans in place before we can truly help others.  Child Care Providers must also have an emergency preparedness plan.

A well-thought-out communication plan is of the utmost importance to reunify you with your loved ones.  It should include a physical location, an alternate contact nearby as well as a contact out of state.  Your individual/family plan may have one or all these subcategories:  emergency plans for home, 0 work, childcare, school, and/or college.

Ready.gov has many resources available to navigate the process of creating your individual/family plan.

Mental Health

Supporting the mental health of everyone involved is important yet often overlooked.  Start by checking if you have your own specific needs met.  Then begin assessing the rest of your group.  Are they getting their basic needs fulfilled:  sleep, food, exercise?  Next check to see if their social emotional well-being is OK.  Children are also impacted by disasters and can express their stress in many ways.  We need to plan to support children during an emergency.  Put items in your Go Kit that can help a child cope and process the event, such as paper and crayons, a stuffed animal, small puppets, etc.

If we are all prepared individually and we communicate our plans with loved ones, an emergency can be less devastating on you and your loved ones.

Written By: Kristin Horn, STARS Coach, EP Lead