By AMBER SOUTH
@ShipNewsGirl
Are you a youth with a dream to become a hometown hero?
Shippensburg Fire Department wants you to join its ranks for a day this summer to experience the various responsibilities required of a firefighter. In the end, participants will have better insight into what it means to be a volunteer firefighter and the fire department will have a fresh crew of potential recruits.
That is the two-fold purpose of the event Child’s Dream, after all, said Shippensburg Fire Chief Randy O’Donnell. The program helps the department incite interest among boys and girls ages 11 to 13, creating a larger group of 14-year-olds who will want to become junior firefighters.
Recruiting has been a challenge in recent years as preteens have more and more other things they might rather do, O’Donnell said. Each year though, Child’s Dream helps influence two to three participants to join the fire department.
About 15 kids participate each year. Under the mentorship of fire department members – some who were once Child’s Dream participants themselves — kids get hands-on practice with firefighting duties through games on first aid, fire extinguisher use, hose line drills, vehicle rescue and more. There is even an obstacle course that pulls everything together, O’Donnell said.
These games are what really show participants if being a firefighter is a good fit for them or not, O’Donnell said. But dislike is not the end of the line.
“At the end of the day what we’re really teaching is volunteerism. If firefighting is not for you, there are other things you can do in the fire department, EMS or in other parts of the community,” he said.
Child’s Dream is scheduled 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. June 9 at Vigilant Hose Company, but registration is required by May 17. Applications are available through any three of the stations that make up SFD: Vigilant Hose Company, 532-2345 or http://www.viglilanthose.com; Cumberland Valley Hose Company, 532-4515 or http://www.cvhose.com; or West End Fire and Rescue, 532-5555 or http://www.wefr15.com; or call O’Donnell at 729-0869. The program is free. Each participant will get an SFD T-shirt.
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Amber South can be reached at asouth@publicopinionnews.com and 262-4771.