Child Care Emergency Preparedness
In Missouri, emergencies are associated with weather events such as ice storms, snow storms, tornadoes, floods and earthquakes. Other types of emergencies that may impact child care providers include fires, electrical outages, and car/van accidents. On May 22, 2011, the community of Joplin was struck by one of the deadliest and most destructive tornadoes in American history. Among the devastation, 19 child care centers were destroyed and eight others were badly damaged leaving families in child care crisis. Missouri child care licensing rules require providers to have an emergency preparedness plan. Child care programs that have emergency/disaster plans are better able to react, protect, and respond to the needs of those involved.
Disaster and Emergency Preparedness Online Training
The Section for Child Care Regulation presents a 1-hour training on Disaster and Emergency Preparedness in child care. This training is available at no cost to providers and is approved to meet the department's required annual training requirement.
This training is designed to increase awareness of disasters and emergencies should they occur in your area and to assist you in developing a written plan specifically for your facility on how you would deal with these events to meet the department’s licensing rules (19 CSR 30-62.090 and 19 CSR 30-61.090).
Additional Information
The below information may be of use to early childhood and school age providers in preparing for an emergency or responding to a disaster.
- Child Care Emergency Plan Template
- AAP Family Readiness Kit
- Ready in 3
- Missouri Department of Transportation
- Missouri State Emergency Management Agency
- Missouri Office of Homeland Security
- Missouri Storm Aware
- Federal Emergency Management Agency
- U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Preparedness
- Center for Disease Control Emergency Preparedness
- Environmental Protection Agency
- Thunderstorms, Tornadoes, Lightning...A Preparedness Guide