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Eight Joliet West High School students in the Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) organization completed an eight-week Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) program this fall.

The CERT program provided students with the training necessary to better prepare for responding to emergency situations in our community. Student participants include Jasmine Bond, Paola Castro, Madelyn Fier, Lucy Magat, Joseph Owens, Uma Patel, Tha Mee Shaw and Keko Stennis.

"When emergencies happen, CERT members give critical support to first responders, provide immediate assistance to victims, and organize spontaneous volunteers at disaster sites," said HOSA Sponsor Mary Spata. "CERT members also help with non-emergency projects that help improve the safety of our community."

The CERT course included disaster preparedness, fire safety/suppression, disaster medical operations, light search and rescue operations, CERT organization, disaster psychology, and terrorism. Students completed a written examination and a disaster-related exercise held on Saturday October 26, which tested the CERT skills taught during the course.

The CERT program works with the Illinois Citizen Corps Council, the Illinois Emergency Management Agency, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and New Lenox CERT is coordinated by Daniel Martin.

HOSA is an international student organization recognized by the U.S. Department of Education and the Health Science Education (HSE) Division of ACTE. HOSA's two-fold mission is to promote career opportunities in the health care industry and to enhance the delivery of quality health care to all people. HOSA's goal is to encourage all health science instructors and students to join and be actively involved in the HSE-HOSA Partnership.