Need Something to Do? Here's Some Recommended ARES Training
- Details
- Category: EmComm/Disaster Relief
- Written by Blake Raab (N4BWR)
While many of us may have some extra time on our hands (and thank you to those in the medical profession and public safety who may not), here is a good list of courses that will qualify you in most ARES situations and give you a general idea of the operating structure of our partner agencies. These come from the Georgia ARES Task Book
From FEMA
- IS-100 - Introduction to the Incident Command System
- IS-200 - Basic Incident Command System for Initial Response
- IS-700 - An Introduction to the National Incident Management System
- IS-800 - National Response Framework, an Introduction
- IS-120 - An Introduction to Exercises
- IS-230 - Fundamentals of Emergency Management
- IS-235 - Emergency Planning
- IS-240 - Leadership and Influence
- IS-241 - Decision Making and Problem Solving
- IS-242 - Effective Communication
- IS-244 - Developing and Managing Volunteers
- IS-288 - The Role of Voluntary Organizations in Emergency Management
- IS-2200 - Basic Emergency Operations Center Functions
From ARRL
I'm linking to the descriptions for all of these courses on the same page. From there, you can click an individual course and go through the process of registering. Visit this page to look at all of the courses.
EC-001 - Introduction to Emergency Communication - This course provides the basic knowledge and tools for emergency communications volunteers. It has gone through some evolution and transition. The course used to be heavily tied to an individual mentor for each student and required the student to complete assignments that the mentor would approve and then add extra information and personal experience. It has now moved to a format where there are mentors in a forum, but the assignments are not required. There is also a completely un-mentored version. I very strongly recommend taking advantage of having the mentors and their knowledge and experience, as well as completing the assignments for your own learning and self-evaluation.
- EC-016 - Public Service and Emergency Communications Management for Radio Amateurs - This one has been an un-mentored course, at least for as long as I can remember. It reviews a lot of the information in EC-001 and then adds some other topics that will help prepare you for leadership positions within ARES with topics about recruiting and managing volunteers and coordinating community events.
- PR-101 - This is a basic training course for anyone aspiring to be an ARES PIO (Public Information Officer), but I would recommend it for anyone who may be deployed in a public environment.
Other
- SKYWARN Spotter Training - I personally think this one is always better when you can take it in person, but it is the same material in the online course. This will give you the knowledge to effectively report severe weather to the National Weather Service, know what to report, and what not to report.
