We had our second fire drill yesterday.
Sorry this isn’t the full footage… 
Spectralert Advances heard, you could probably faintly hear some Spectralert Classics I mentioned a few months ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBKES4Y7KF8
During seventh period today (the portable) I could hear a faint, but distinctive A# characteristic of an Integrity in Code-3! Apparently the middle school, which is very close to my high school, was having a fire drill in the rain! When I went there, it had 4903-9101 plates with 9838 horns in the old wing, and newer 4903 electromechanical horn-strobes in the newer wing. I guess the FWR from the EST-3 killed the 4903s and were replaced by Integrities, at least outside.
Location: Ontario Middle School; Building A
Time: 4th Period
Date: November 25, 2014
The system was activated by staff. What was weird is the spectras did 3 seconds straight and then started coding them selves… :shock:
Why aren’t y’all in Thanksgiving break yet? Sheesh, school districts in Oregon are mean!
My break:
Wednesday-Sunday
Spring break we get a hole week! I’m going to DC and NY with classmates so FA and siren stuff from there.
We have had two drills and one false alarm so far.
12/8/14:
First period (band) was about 90 seconds away from ending, when the ZHs sounded while we were rehearsing! The director jokingly said “No wait! One more time!” before he dropped the baton in disappointment and led us outside. The rest of the drill continued as normal. I then asked the AP after the drill why they conducted it so late (they usually go off around 30-60 seconds into class) and he told me they had to have one at an odd time in the event an alarm goes off at a weird time. You see, we only do intentional drills during first, third, seventh, and eighth periods, unless someone pulls it (has not happened while I was there) or if a waterflow switch trips (happens around once a year) so that caught us off-guard. Second period is the attendance period, so all teachers are required to take attendance then. They don’t have drills during this period so if the alarm goes off, a kid could leave campus after being counted present. Fourth and sixth periods are lunch, and fifth period is lunch for the Special Education kids and so that the cafeteria workers can prepare for the next lunch period.
I feel so bad for the kids that were caught in the bathrooms when the alarms went off…
You have 8 periods a day? How long are they? We only have 5 (rotating schedule, of course)
About fifty minutes.
First period: 8:50 to 9:39
Second period: 9:45 to 10:35
Third period: 10:42 to 11:30
Fourth period: 11:37 to 12:25
Fifth period: 12:32 to 1:20
Sixth period: 1:27 to 2:15
Seventh period: 2:22 to 3:10
Eighth period: 3:17 to 4:05
The more I think about it, rotating block schedules seem to be better because you have more time for each class, you have fewer of them per day, and it’s structured similarly to a college schedule. I’m pretty sure no sane college student takes seven classes a day.
My school has a rotating 5-period day, with “blue” and “silver” days (our school colors) alternating every other day. So classes 1, 2, and 5 are the ones that switch every other day. Academy is time we get every day to do homework, talk to teachers, etc. I’ve gone ahead and put the number of drills for each period in red next to them for the semester since we’re already done with all of our drills. Clearly they need to do a better job of “distributing” the drills so they’re not all condensed in the same class/on the same day.
Blue/Silver 1: 7:45-9:05 2 (Both Blue)
Academy/Interventions: 9:05-9:40
Blue/Silver 2: 9:40-11:00 1 (Blue)
Block 3: 11:05-11:50
Lunch: 11:50-12:35
Block 4: 12:35-1:20 2
Blue/Silver 5: 1:25-2:45
But wow, I couldn’t imagine having all 8 classes every day. The days that we do have all 8 always suck haha.
Also, here’s a video of the November fire drill, which was one of the drills during Block 4:
It’s really hard because all of your teachers assign homework that’s almost always due the very next day, regardless of any other classes you have. I dunno, blame the TEA.
One Wednesday each month is designated as a “Late Start”, where classes don’t start until fifteen minutes later, but the day still ends at 4:05.
Period 1 9:05 - 9:48
Period 2 9:54 - 10:44
Period 3 10:50 - 11:33
Period 4 11:39 - 12:27 (Lunch)
Period 5 12:33 - 1:21
Period 6 1:27 - 2:15 (Lunch)
Period 7 2:21 - 3:11
Period 8 3:17 - 4:05
I actually started a new topic about schedules!
<URL url="Your School Schedule Rotation text=“viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6902”>Your School Schedule Rotation
rotating’s a lot better, less time spent running from class to class and getting going, more time actually working. also an extra day to do homework.
in college you wont have any classes every day of the week, and they’ll most likely be at different times throughout the week… the whole schedule is pretty much random.
This is funny. With NJ state laws requiring now requiring 2 school evacuations in a school year, my school took it to the next level. They planned a fire evacuation during the lunch block! Since my school serves about 1600 kids lunch in one block this got interesting. I ditched lunch early to talk to a staff member in the office. So while I was in the office I could overhear the assistant principal talking on the radio to someone checking upstairs bathrooms. I didn’t think much of it but then the alarm went off, I was so amused by their decision I wish I was at lunch to see everyone’s reactions. They did this once before in October but that was during passing time. Did anyone have a similar experience like this?
I went ahead and moved your posts out of the School Rotation schedule topic into this one because I feel like it relates more to fire drills in schools and also because it was a bump of the other topic. Please be careful about bumping in the future.
So far I have noticed a trend in our fire drills already. First off, they are most common in my Period 6 & 7 classes. A few had happened in Period 8. Period 1, 3 & 5 have had a drill once and none have actually occurhappened
So far I’ve narrowed it down to:
September: Fire Drill Period 7 & Evac Drill Period 2
October: Fire Drill Period 6 & In class lockdown Period 1 (I really don’t know how to describe it but it’s a regular class time but with doors locked and windows blinded)
November: Lockdown Period 3
December: Fire Drill Block 8
January: Fire Drill Period 7
February: Fire Drill Period 8
March: Fire Drill Period 6
April: Fire Drill Period 1 & Evac Drill Period 1
May: Fire Drill Period 6
Hang on had to fix a time in my post for February. Unfortunately the time frame ran out.
Well today was the last day for grades 9-11 and the fire alarm went off! Since only 2 final exams were scheduled for most kids they let us go 80 minutes early. While waiting for the bus outside, the admin and school security was screaming at us to go onto the hill across the parking lot. I was confused and then some kid said there was a fire. My school has P2R’s outside the front of the school but they don’t work for some reason? So I couldn’t hear the alarms but could see the strobes from the 2nd floor classrooms. Within 2-3 minutes the fire marshal and one fire truck was on scene and left within about 8 minutes. I still don’t know why it went off but very interesting! There was also graduation practice at the time. So because of this we had to stay an extra hour! :evil: