Red Cross Volunteer Training Discussed by Starke County COAD

Posted on October 3, 2018
Author Jacque Ryan, WKVI

Local individuals driven to help in the event of an emergency recently attended a Red Cross volunteer training session held at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Knox.

The church’s parish nurse Sharon Krick organized the session in conjunction with the Starke County Community Organizations Active in Disaster (COAD). Krick reported that it was a pretty successful event. There were 24 individuals who indicated that they were interested and the majority showed up. About 20 people attended the training course on Sunday, September 23rd.

Disaster Program Manager of Northern Indiana Abe Rivas ran the session and provided a number of different scenarios in which a team of local volunteers would be useful.

From shelter work during major crises to providing assistance to a family after a house fire, there are a variety of ways that volunteers are needed right here in our community. Rivas also explained that in order to become a certified Red Cross volunteer, individuals have to sign up via the organization’s website.

Though Tuesday night’s COAD meeting was sparsely attended, members kicked around the idea of potentially hosting a future training session in the library so that computers would be accessible immediately following the informative presentation. This could potentially increase the number of people who follow up with the additional steps to become a certified Red Cross volunteer.

Though the procedure isn’t overly complicated, it does require interested volunteers to create a Red Cross ID and fill out a form with some questions about the types of opportunities they’d be interested in. If the training group was to go through this process together, it could create more of an incentive to carry through with it right away.