Table Top Exercise
Development
Overview and Orientation
Washington State School Directors
Association
November 23, 2013
Zillah School District Active Shooter
• Todays recreation is a highly shortened version of a
table top and full scale exercise
• The typical planning process can take up to one year
• Zillah plan was done in about 6 months
• It started with a Table Top which we’re
demonstrating this morning
• It culminated in a full scale exercise
Purpose & Critical Preplanning Elements
• Relationships & Partnerships for Schools
• Fire, Law Enforcement, Emergency Management, EMS,
Mental Health
• The importance of Preplanning; determining roles
and jurisdictional issues during a crisis
• Who’s in charge; fire or law enforcement; and under what
circumstances?
• Schools:
• Fire and law enforcement will rely upon you to;
• Manage students and staff
• Parents and others will be drawn to an event; you will
have to manage “reunification”
Critical Elements
• Incident Command System (ICS)
– It is important for school leadership to be trained and understand the
Incident Command System; have back-up personnel; train the entire
crisis team
– A critical leader in the school will be expected to be part of “Unified
Command.” School Board members need to be aware of ICS
• Active Shooter and other Events
– What are your hazards and potential crisis situations?
– Practice and drill towards identified hazards and possibilities
• Table Tops, like other exercises, are processes to get us talking
to one another & evaluate our systems and plans
– Schools cannot and should not train/drill in a vacuum
Exercise 101
The Planning Process
• Make it as real as possible
– This is the time and place to make mistakes, evaluate and learn
– Do not just “go through the motions” and “check the box”
• Goals, Objectives - What do you what to accomplish?
• Identify a Planning Team - Who will put this
together?
• Scope of Play - What are you capable of doing?
• Cost of the Program
Exercise Planning
• Time line
• Scenario- test the school crisis response plan
• Scope of Play – Who’s playing and what will
they bring to the party
• Community Sensitivities
• Exercise Logistics
• After Action Review
• Improvement Plan
A School Districts Perspective
Relationship with Emergency Services
• Have a plan and a procedure
– What to do when a crisis hits
– Identify local hazards and develop plans accordingly
• Regularly practice the plan
– With fire and law enforcement involvement
– Addressing different conditions and scenarios
• Communicate before, during and after
–
–
–
–
Fire, law enforcement
Staff & Students
Parents & Community
Have a media plan
• Evaluate, Evaluate, Evaluate; this should lead to an
improvement plan, for every drill and actual event
A School Districts Perspective
• Planning for an Active
Shooter & Other Events
• At the school
• Other schools
• Reunification
– For parents and students
in predetermined
locations
• Transportation
• Student support
• Specific duties for staff
during crisis
• School the next day,
week, month?
• Anticipate potential
occurrences by
monitoring anniversary
dates of past events
A Law Enforcement Perspective
• These events take priority over every
other call we have.
• With rapid confirmation we will be
pulling out all the stops to get as many
Law Enforcement Officers from as many
agencies there as quickly as possible.
A Law Enforcement Perspective
(Lt. Brian Winter)
• Officers are well trained and equipped for this
event.
– Unless your school has an SRO, law enforcement
will not be there when the event starts
• What we need, but can not control, is for the
school to be equally as prepared. An Active
Shooter event is a fight that we must win in
advance, through in-depth planning and
preparation involving the school, LE and Fire
A Fire Service Perspective
(Ken Robillard)
• This is a Law Enforcement Incident (with
assistance from the Schools, Fire Department,
and many others)
• Most current Department protocols – staging
at a safe distance until the scene is secure by
PD
• Definition of “Secure Scene”
A Fire Service Perspective
• Two different types of entry with the Fire
Department
– Casualty Collection Point (CCP), or Warm Zone,
PD collects wounded and brings them to one
point
– Collection or Rescue Teams – (multiple) Teams of
two EMS personnel are escorted into the warm
zone and they pick up the casualties and bring
them to a transfer spot and return for more
– “The Golden Hour”
A Fire Service Perspective
• Pre Incident Meetings
• Communication, Communication,
Communication
• Local Policies and Procedures for School
Shootings & other events
– Fire Department – “Risk a lot to save a lot”
– Fire Department – Golden Hour
Other Agencies, Departments, etc.
Involved (Jim Hall)
•
•
•
•
•
•
Other Schools, School Districts
Multiple Police and Fire Agencies
Hospitals
Public Works
Red Cross
Mental Health
Management of Information and Media
•
•
•
•
•
Twitter
Facebook
Broadcast Media
National Media
What will or does your “SYSTEM” look like
Incident Command System (ICS)
Zillah School District
Table Top Exercise Overview
• Make it as real as possible given the scope of
the exercise
• Players in Exercise Staging Area
• Exercise Props – Visual Aids (Map Table)
Exercise
Setting the Stage
• We are at the Zillah Middle School
• School is in session, it is November 23, 2013, a normal
day
• School staff are there and doing their normal work
• Weather is what it is today
Exercise Play
• Handout-Zillah Middle School Active Shooter
After Action Report and Improvement Plan
• FEMA Homeland Security Exercise Evaluation
Program (HSEEP) Information Paper
Exercise Play
• Handout Injects to those playing roles
• Discussion
• Exercise Play as time permits
END OF EXERCISE
DISCUSSION - QUESTIONS