DOHA: A senior official of the Civil Defence Department has called on the Supreme Education Council (SEC) to prepare new safety and security guidelines for schools in the country that can effectively address emergency situations like fire.
The guidelines currently circulated by the SEC among Independent schools were prepared in 2009 and they have not been updated since then, a workshop on school safety at the Qatar Technical School (QTS) was told.
The situation is even worse in private schools many of which do not have any plans or guidelines related to safety and security, it was disclosed at the workshop, a local Arabic daily has reported.
Major Hussain Aman of the Civil Defence Department, while addressing the workshop called on the SEC to come out with a new safety and security plan for the schools.
Ameera Al Sadr of the SEC disclosed that 36 schools in the country are still lacking a fire alarm system, while 81 percent of the Independent and private schools are equipped with such a system.
There are a total of 233 Independent school buildings and 160 private school buildings in Qatar. The Civil Defence Department has been inspecting all school buildings to ensure that they meet the safety and security requirements, she said.
“It is important to set up a safety task force in every school and prepare a plan for training the staff,” she said.
Over the past six months, the Civil Defence Department conducted 150 mock fire drills at Independent and private schools to get them prepared for emergency situations, the workshop was told.
Abdullah Shams of QTS said the school decided to host the workshop to bring the issue of safety in schools to the focus and address the shortcomings in this field. The Peninsula
