International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS) | Volume V, Issue VIII, August 2021 | ISSN 2454–6186

Strategies to Raise Awareness on Fire Disaster Preparedness to Enhance Fire Safety in Secondary Schools in Kilimanjaro Region, Tanzania

Emmanuel Jeremiah Kileo¹(PhD Candidate), Gadi Koda², Ogoti E. Okendo³
(Members of Faculty of Education)
Department of Educational Management, Planning & Financing and Lifelong Learning (DMPFL),
Mwenge Catholic University, Tanzania

Abstract – This study was conducted to determine strategies through which awareness on fire disaster preparedness is raised among students and teachers to enhance fire safety in secondary schools in Kilimanjaro region, Tanzania. This study was guided by Rasmussen’s Risk Management Framework (1997). This study employed a convergent design under mixed methods research approach. The participants involved in this study were head of schools, teachers, students in public and private secondary schools; District Education Officers, and District Fire Officers. Furthermore, stratified sampling was used to obtain the research sample. This study used questionnaires, observation guide, interview guides and document analysis guide to collect data which were then analyzed descriptively and thematically. The findings revealed that training was the major strategy used to raise awareness on fire disaster preparedness; aspects of fire safety were integrated into the Ordinary Level secondary education syllabi. Additionally, meetings and clubs are avenues which were fairly used to raise students’ and teachers’ awareness on fire disaster preparedness. However, other strategies like using posters, television educative programs or news, resource materials, fire safety drills, and school fire safety inspection feedback were rarely used to raise students’ and teachers’ awareness on fire disaster preparedness. The study concluded that secondary schools had not embraced the diversity of strategies that can be used to raise students’ and teachers’ awareness on fire disaster preparedness and recommended inter alia, that comprehensive fire disaster management topics be incorporated in the Ordinary Level secondary education syllabi.

Keywords: Fire Disaster, Preparedness, Awareness, Fire Safety

I.INTRODUCTION

Adisaster is an adverse event that overwhelms an individual’s, an organization’s, or jurisdiction’s capacity to respond (Haddow, Bullock & Coppola, 2017). A school fire disaster is an extreme disruption of its functioning associated with devastating damage to property and injury or death to school community members caused by rapid, persistent fire releasing heat, smoke, light and flame in a way that exceeds the ability of the affected school to cope with the emergency situation by using its own resources. According to Nyagawa (2017) who investigated the immediate causes of fire disasters in boarding secondary schools in Tanzania, fire disasters electrical faults, indiscipline and riots among students, the use of kerosene lamps and candles to study during the night . These findings concur with findings of another study