ORANGE : First-Aid Training Pays Fast Dividend

One month after learning first aid in a program of the Orange Unified School District, Pam White used it to save the life of her 14-year-old son, Brian.

The Whites had gathered at a local restaurant for a big family dinner.

“I was eating, and Brian was on my left,” recalled White, 37, a duplication clerk for the district. “I heard my husband say, ‘Are you all right?’ to Brian. I looked up, and he had his hands around his throat because he was choking.”

White jumped up, performed the Heimlich maneuver, and a piece of meat blocking Brian’s airway popped free. In the maneuver, air is forced up the windpipe by application of sudden, sharp pressure on the abdomen just below the rib cage.

Through a program launched last semester, Orange Unified officials and parents hope that like White, all of the district’s 2,500 teachers, administrators and staff will be trained in basic first aid and cardiopulmonary resuscitation within two to three years. Employees will voluntarily attend two four-hour, after-school sessions taught by school nurses. And it is hoped that the training won’t cost the district a dime.

The program is the brainchild of parent Suzette Gibbs, incoming president of the Orange Community Council, an umbrella group that represents the district’s parent-teacher associations, and chairwoman of the project’s advisory panel.

Gibbs became alarmed last year at the possibility of the school district losing its health clerks to budget cuts. The jobs were eventually saved, but Gibbs felt the situation “pointed out the need for more trained personnel on campus” and set out to do something about it.

The school district had a small first-aid training program in place, but Gibbs wanted to expand the program to certify all employees more quickly and at no cost to the district. She recruited a committee of school district staff, community members and city, police and fire officials from Orange and Anaheim, and the group is now seeking support from local businesses to reimburse the district for the cost of the program, estimated to be about $3,500 for the first year.

Orange Unified School District Supt. Norman C. Guith commended the program, saying it “takes a burden off the district and adds a dimension of safety for our students.”

The 35-school district employs eight full-time nurses and one health clerk at least part time on every campus. But the need for an extensive first-aid program remains, said nurse Jane McCloud, the district’s health coordinator.

“The health clerk can’t be everywhere,” McCloud said. “This will give us a better support system and give parents more confidence in the schools.”

The program will also provide the wider community with hundreds of people who can assist in the event of a disaster, she added.

Organizers see the program as a potential model for other school districts caught in the budget vise.

“This is a unique partnership between community leaders, the district and private enterprise, combining to help the kids without costing the taxpayers any money,” said advisory panel member Bob Zemel. “And what we’re getting is a lifesaving program.”

Participants in the program learn about CPR, choking, shock, seizures, controlling bleeding, and assessing illness and injuries, among other skills.

White, grateful for the training she received, had this advice: “Take first aid if you can get it anywhere, because you never know whose life you’re going to save.”