By Donald Wittkowski
Interspersed with their History, English and Calculus classes on Tuesday, the seniors at Ocean City High School were also learning something else far more important — how to save lives.
Their training in Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) and with Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) may very well prevent someone from dying of a heart attack some day.
“You never know when an incident can happen. You could save someone’s life,” said one senior, Jared Jones.
The “teachers” in this class weren’t at all talkative, but the students were learning from them anyway.
The room was filled with mannequins that doubled as cardiac victims and allowed the students to practice their lifesaving skills under the guidance of school nurses and the Ocean City Fire Department.
“Good job, guys,” Carl Brown, an emergency medical technician and paramedic, said while praising the students after they performed chest compression on the mannequins.
Next, Brown showed the students how to operate the AEDs, the portable devices that shock the heart back into normal rhythm after it stops beating.
Five AEDs are stored in Ocean City High School. Myriad others can be found in police cars, at fire stations, recreation centers, shopping outlets and other places where people gather.
“In Ocean City, you can trip over these things,” Brown said. “Everywhere there is a large number of the public, there is an AED.”
Once activated, the AEDs include an automated voice that gives step by step instructions on how to use them, making them easy to operate in emergency situations.
“You cannot possibly mess it up, as long as you listen to the machines,” Brown told the students.
AED training augments the instruction students receive in CPR.
Like her fellow senior Jared Jones, Frances Kane recognizes the importance of the emergency training.
“I think it’s very helpful and necessary, especially if you’re going away to college,” Kane said.
Overall, the students seem to take the training very seriously, said Capt. Ray Clark, a Fire Department member who supervises the program.
“Last year, we trained over 280 kids and there was not a single problem,” Clark said. “It’s different from the students’ daily routine. It’s hands-on.”
A state law that started in 2014 requires that New Jersey students must learn CPR and how to operate AEDs in order to graduate from high school.
In addition, another state law that began in 2014 requires New Jersey’s public and private schools to be equipped with AEDs and to develop emergency plans to respond to sudden cardiac arrest.
Known as Janet’s Law, it was named after Janet Zilinski, an 11-year-old girl from Warren who collapsed and died of sudden cardiac arrest in 2006 following cheerleading practice.
Ocean City school and fire officials, however, stressed that the high school’s emergency training programs began before the laws went into effect and are far more extensive than the state’s basic requirements for CPR and AEDs.
“We don’t know of any other high school doing this in the state,” Clark said of Ocean City’s rigorous standards.
“We’re so far ahead of the state’s initiative,” added Ocean City High School Principal Matt Jamison. “For us, it was monumental to get it done.”
Ocean City’s seniors receive four hours of classroom instruction to become certified for two years in CPR and with the use of AEDs. Clark noted that Ocean City’s eighth graders and sophomores are also in line for lifesaving training, although it will be less intensive than the instruction for seniors.
“Eventually, every student in Ocean City High School will be exposed to CPR,” Clark said, explaining that the time frame for doing that is 2017.
For now, the program concentrates on seniors. Clark said 286 seniors will go through the certification process this year. Hundreds of eighth graders and sophomores will begin their less rigorous “awareness program” this year.
The Ocean City Fire Department actually began CPR training in the school district 12 or 13 years ago. The program waned because of budgeting and scheduling constraints, but was revived three years ago under the leadership of then-new Fire Chief Chris Breunig.
“This program’s success is the result of cooperation between the school district, the Fire Department, the teachers and, ultimately, the students,” Breunig said.
Clark and Jamison also touted the collaboration between the school district, the Fire Department and the community. Clark, for instance, noted that Shore Medical Center’s Stainton Society fundraising foundation donated $3,000 last year to underwrite the cost of the students’ CPR certification cards.
Eventually, the Fire Department wants to train more staff members at Ocean City High School so they can take the lead in CPR and AED training, Clark said.
Clark, an American Heart Association faculty member, has already trained several staffers at the high school, including nurses, some teachers and the athletic trainer.
Both Clark and Breunig credited the program for already saving lives in Ocean City. In a few cases, former high school students who had received CPR and AED training when they were seniors rendered emergency aid to cardiac victims, keeping them alive until the Fire Department arrived on the scene to take over, they said.
