On the 19th of October RUC held emergency response training drills as part of RUC’s commitment to ensuring the safety of its staff and students, and so as to strengthen students and staff awareness and knowledge of how to respond in emergency situations. There to support the activities were deputy Chairman of the University Council and Chairman of the Discipline Inspection Commission WU Fulai along with Vice President HE Yaomin. The exercises were run by the chief wardens of the University’s emergency response team, with participants from the Environmental Studies Department and the Science Department. Members of the Beijing Fire Service were there to watch over the proceedings and provide support.
There were two parts to the drills being practiced on the day – a live fire-fighting drill and a first aid training course. The fire-fighting drill was run so as to imitate a real-life fire: the drill began with the fire warden reporting the fire; following, the person on duty confirmed the incident; the emergency response began; the security patrol arrived to provide backup; the fire-response team put on their PPE and fire prevention equipment and entered the scene of the fire; volunteers arrived to usher the students and teachers to safety; paramedics from the university hospital arrived to treat the wounded; fire-fighters arrived to extinguish the fire and rescue anyone still in the danger zone. The exercise went smoothly and according to plan, and the emergency response department were extremely pleased with the success of the drill.
After the fire-fighting drill had finished, the emergency volunteers and fire-fighters held a lecture and demonstration on emergency response and first-aid for the students and staff. The content of the course included how to extinguish a fire, how to escape in an emergency, and training in emergency first response. All staff and students actively participated in the demonstrations and exercises, with some learning new skills and some improving old skills, and all gaining much from the experience.
Prior to the drills, chemistry professor WANG Peng held a talk on safety and emergency response in the laboratory. From this talk, students learned a lot about laboratory safety, and increased their understanding of the potential dangers of working in a laboratory.
RUC takes emergency response training very seriously, and takes pride in its efforts to educate students in emergency response procedures. This was the first large scale emergency response training exercise in 2016-17, and the first event in a series of like programmes to be held in this academic year.
RUC believes that knowledge imparted on its students has a flow-on effect to all people the student associates with in the society in which they live. In this, RUC hopes that the safety education students receive will benefit not only the student, but society as a whole. RUC continually strives to improve its techniques and methods in education, and safety education is no exception. Beginning in 2014 when the RUC Emergency Volunteer Service Team was established, the results achieved in emergency response education of students and staff have been remarkable. Since the establishment of the Safety Education Centre in 2015, almost 10,000 students and staff have been educated in emergency response measures.
