Students at both Joliet Township High Schools and Joliet Catholic Academy have become the first teens to complete FEMA’s Community Emergency Response Team training program, made possible through a partnership with the Joliet Office of Emergency and Disaster Management.

The Los Angeles Fire Department originally developed CERT training in the 1980s after seeing reports of civilian responses to disasters in Mexico and Japan.

Officials observed that civilians often try to help each other in emergencies – but a lack of training can put volunteers and victims in additional danger.

The CERT program aims to organize civilians into volunteer emergency response forces who can deploy into a community in the event of natural disasters or terrorist attacks.

Joliet Office of Emergency and Disaster Management Director John Lukancic has made efforts to bring the program to the city in the past year.

Throughout 2025, 77 adults have graduated from the office’s nine-week program. As of December, 21 high school students will join their ranks as certified volunteer crisis responders.

“John reached out to the district last spring, as well as JCA , and we all decided to do it,” Joliet Central Building Operations Assistant Principal Steve Locke said. “Each class can accommodate 20 students at a time, but we ended up with each having, I think, seven to nine who followed through all the way.”

What training involves

Students in the program attend an hour-long class two days a week after school to receive their training through the course of one semester.

For the first pilot program, high schools reached out to seniors and juniors who had indicated they were interested in going into the medical field, the military or the police or fire department as career options.

Although the schools all began with full classes, several students were unable to continue because of scheduling conflicts.

Students involved in fall sports or activities will be given priority before other seniors and juniors in signing up for the class for the spring semester, Locke said. The class will be open to younger students next year.

Throughout the 23 class sessions, students are trained in the following:

• basic first aid and triage practices,

• weather spotting,

• home disaster preparedness,

• fire safety,

• light search and rescue,

• how to shut off utilities in a home,

• incident command and communication protocols,

• how to respond to hazmat or terrorist situations.

Each student also was given a backpack of supplies they are expected to use in the event they respond to an emergency. These kits include CERT vests, helmets, flashlights, gloves, goggles, basic tools and first aid supplies.

In the event of a community emergency, students who completed the program are contacted alongside adults who have finished training, before being paired with adult volunteers in the field.

“In case of an emergency, if first responders were delayed or unable to arrive quickly, our students could go help with emergency aid,” Locke said.

Life-saving skills

During their last regular session, Joliet Central’s students were tasked with locating a CPR dummy which had been “injured” in the school and treating its described wounds.

Students found the dummy sprawled in a stairwell before they “stabilized” it by splinting and applying tourniquets to its injured limbs. Only after did they gently carry it from the scene to safety.

Lukancic praised the students’ work after evaluating their work.

“This is a splendid splint,” he said, holding up the dummy’s bandaged arm. “These things are never pretty. They aren’t supposed to be. They only need to make sure the broken bone can’t move.”

Lukancic said he’d seen people with more training than the students do “much worse” in drills, calling the students’ performance “a 9 or 10.”

“We’ve had a good group of kids from all three of the schools,” Lukancic said. “It’s gone really well. They’re all engaged. They’re interested. They’re remembering things I taught them in September and volunteering to lead drills. They’re awesome. I’m very proud of what they’ve achieved.”

Students Fernanda Martinez, Jazmine Tena and Beatriz Campa are juniors who enrolled in the program because they expressed interest in going into the professions in the medical field.

Their enthusiasm shone through when talking about their experience in the program.

“When we saw the email, I thought it was really interesting and cool that it was brand new,” Martinez said. “It’s cool because we can’t learn these things anywhere else.”

“My favorite part is that we are learning important stuff that we can use in life or death situations,” Tena said.

Campa said that the “hands on practice” was the best part of the experience: “Getting to actually practice and hearing it was done well made us really realize, ‘Hey, we could do this.’ ”

Hopes for it to grow

All three said that being the first to experience the program was exciting.

“It was cool to get to tell people about it and what we were doing,” Martinez said.

“Being the first group to do it makes it feel special too,” Campa said. “I liked telling my parents about what we were doing and what I learned. Now my mom wants to take the adult class.”

“I’ve told a lot of my friends about it, and they’re interested,” Tena said. “I think something like this, people are going to see it and want to do it too.”

All three said they would love to continue the program if extra levels were offered, and they hope to see it grow.

Lukancic said he would consider adding more levels, but added that he would have to see how progress continues before expanding the program.

“I hope the program keeps growing,” he said. “All three schools are doing it again next semester, and I’ll keep doing it as long as they want, because I love teaching it.”

Joliet Central will be the last school to complete the course Tuesday. Graduates from all three schools’ programs then will be recognized in January by the Joliet City Council. JTHS students will be honored at a future school board meeting.