NSW Fire and Rescue Assistant Commissioner for Education and Training Janet Ruecroft made a special appearance to the Young Fire and Rescue Unit last Wednesday, February 20 as she makes a trip around New South Wales.
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Janet aims to effectively communicate with staff to find what their needs are by visiting stations and communities to ensure that the teams are receiving the required training and education specific to their surrounds.
"It's their training and education in which I am in charge of, so I wanted to come here in person and see that our rural staffs needs and wants are being looked after in terms of that department," Janet said.
"It is so important for me to take visits to our rural areas and too be able to ensure that our country staffs needs are front and foremost in what they are doing."
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According to Janet, Fire and Rescue training can be different for country units as opposed to those based in cities due to the likeliness and unlikeliness of particular scenarios.
"Training such as scenario training can definitely be different for our country units, for instance, there wouldn't be much point in us training our Young Fire and Rescue staff to do a ship fire," Janet said.
"That's because the chances of them ever getting a ship fire out here is negligible I would think.
"And vise versa, there also wouldn't be much point in us training staff of what to do during a silo fire in Redfern.
"So it's really about looking at what the needs are of the staff in their particular area and ensuring that there is staff there trained specifically in that area, but then we are also making sure that our general ability across the line is always still kept at whatever it is that the community and community unites need."
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During this week Janet will continue west, covering the entire west side of her New South Wales allocated area.
Janet will be visiting multiple different places to ensure that she was given first hand evidence of the different units training and education in order to get a vision of what the unit may need.
Janet delves into the importance of understanding the area surrounding a unit in which they are based at with her own eyes, as that is the most effective way to be able to deliver the best education and training.
"Next month I will then be going north, as far up as about Lismore and then the month after that I will be going south right up to the Victorian boarder," Janet said.
"It's a big trip, but it's really, really important and it's good information that's coming back to us that helps us ensure that we are really providing necessary needs."
