Supporting Children's Needs Following a Disaster
Introduction
Hurricane Katrina wreaked the Gulf coast of the United States causing the death of more than 1,300 people and dislocation of 1 million people. The disaster causes severe property damage and left 372,000 children without schools. The after shots of the disaster drastically impacted the poor and needy children and adults who took shelter in convention centers, cruise ships and churches. In order to help them the government and local agencies provided food, shelter and support to all these victims. However, it was felt that neither government nor non-government organizations focused on special needs of the children in their relief programs (Save the children, 2006).
1. The professionals should understand the educational requirements of the children. In the case of children the recovery starts with education. To make students swiftly get back to their normal lives initiatives must be taken to reform the schools. So, the first and foremost important need of children is to organize formal and non-formal educational activities.
2. Another important need for children is safe areas for playing. Playing outside is the basic necessity for children, especially for homeless children or those living in shelters? The action plan should entail strategies for reconstructing playgrounds and child care centers so that children would not have to play in insecure and unhealthy areas.
3. Another important requirement is to understand the psychological and emotional needs of the children to provide them emotional support in the classrooms (Lazarus, Jimerson, & Brock, 2014).
4. Professionals should know the precautionary measures and emergency plan actions for increasing awareness in children about how to react if such disaster occurs again and educating children about re-occurrence of emergency and such storms.
5. For the assessment of children needs, the childhood professionals should interview the families who have suffered such disasters and inquire children politely in schools and camps.
Different agencies and government organizations have established relief and recovery programs for handling the outcomes of the storm.
1. Guidelines from these plans can be taken, and the experts and CEOs of such organizations can be contacted to obtain the knowledge and access to different resources for developing an action plan.
2. The experts can help in designing the course of action for the plan.
3. Experts can also indicate the environmental, organizational and social issues which could affect the program while implementing it.
4. Experts can also provide a second opinion on the presented proposal.
5. Experts can help in resource allocation and funding for the execution of the plan.
The two main problems which resulted due to Katrina Hurricane were the shelter issues and delay in getting back to schools for children. For children, their social life starts and ends at school (Berns, 2012). Getting back to education will help them recover from the crisis, forget the pain and loss and build a sense of community in them.
Loney (2008) reported that after three years of the storm, it was found that 40,000 families were still living in mobile homes. Considering this situation, the need of proper accommodation and readjustments is extremely crucial after such disastrous events (Loney, 2008). Due to homelessness the lives of children are also severely disturbed which impact their routine, personal relations with family, security and social life as well.
As an early childhood professional, the problem of educating children can be addressed easily by involving the affected children in educational activities. If reshaping schools took time, small projects could be initiated to involve the children in learning and playing. Being an early childhood professional one can work in alliance with voluntary teams who would be involved in arranging accommodation to the families and children. Temporary arrangements of camps and mobile shelters by the government help in resolving the issue of homelessness. As a childhood professional one can assist the social work agencies in various activities related to the plans and strategies for the post accidental recovery.
The literature review and learning would help in understanding the needs of children in particular that were not previously addressed and in developing an action plan designed on the basis of those needs. The childhood professionals can develop an action plan and set strategies for the victims of disasters like Katrina, based on the findings and knowledge presented in the paper.
List of References
Berns, R. (2012). Helping Children After a Natural Disaster: Information for Parents and Teachers. Stamford: Cengagae Learning.
Lazarus, P., Jimerson, S., & Brock, S. (2014). Helping Children After a Natural Disaster: Information for Parents and Teachers. Retrieved October 17, 2014, from http://www.nasponline.org/resources/crisis_safety/naturaldisaster_ho.aspx
Loney, J. (2008, April 2). Nearly 40,000 Katrina families still in mobile homes. Retrieved October 17, 2014, from http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/04/02/us-storm-hurricanes-katrina-idUSN0239834420080402?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0
Save the children. (2006, September). Katrina Response: Protecting the Children of the Storm. Retrieved October 17, 2014, from http://www.savethechildren.org/atf/cf/%7B9def2ebe-10ae-432c-9bd0-df91d2eba74a%7D/Katrina-Issue-Brief.pdf
