From the Interns' Desk: The Manikin Room

There are a lot of volunteers out in the field preparing for disasters like Hurricane Irene and yesterday's earthquake, but there are also volunteers in classrooms and offices around the country making sure that we can still offer the services and classes we provide no matter what happens.

As interns this summer, Taylor and I got to learn a lot from and work with the volunteers that make services possible every day. 

Before I came to the American Red Cross, I never really thought about CPR training manikins, but now I know how important they are and how much time volunteers and staff spend with them to make sure they're ready for each and every class.

Students need the hands-on experience working with the manikins in our classes to really get comfortable practicing the skills that save lives. Each student is given their own "manikin face" at the start of class, so that everyone gets the chance to practice on their own clean manikin. After each class, each manikin and manikin face goes through a thorough cleaning and sanitation process to ensure that they are safe to use for the next round of students.  All the manikin faces are washed, then washed again with bleach, then air-dried, and finally wrapped in plastic wrap to be stored until they are needed for the next class. The manikins themselves are bathed with antibacterial wipes until they are squeaky-clean and germ-free. Here's a picture of manikin faces drying in the Manikin Room

Taking care of the manikins is a lot of work, and it's important to keep our students safe. The next time you take a CPR class, remember that a volunteer cleaned that manikin just for you :)

Calling for Volunteers! Red Cross Launches Operation Outreach

The American Red Cross of Central Texas is proud to announce the launch of Operation Outreach, in partnership with Serve Austin.

Operation Outreach is one of Serve Austin’s five new initiatives, designed to  meet an urgent community need in a way it hasn't been before. Women military veterans often have a difficult time reintegrating into civil society upon their return from service. Not only must they deal with the challenges that all veterans face, but also additional stresses and hardships that their male counterparts do not. Government studies have shown that female service members have a three times higher rate of failed marriages than male members, they are much more likely than male members to be single parents, and they are four times more likely than non-veteran women to be homeless.

These statistics, coupled with the government estimate that 1 in 3 returning service women have been sexually violated, showcases the pressing need to provide these women with the support and resources to help ease the transition and prevent such statistics from becoming their reality. To undertake such a task, Serve Austin has partnered the American Red Cross of Central Texas to recruit 100 volunteers who they themselves are women veterans or family members of such. These volunteers will proactively interact with returning service women, actively seeking them out in our community and helping them gain access to basic needs such as housing, employment, medical care, and family support. They will be empowered to direct veterans toward appropriate resources and help them navigate the often confusing red tape that is sometimes involved with contacting support services. With over thirty governmental agencies and private support organizations on board to help the Red Cross develop its volunteer training curriculum and compile a comprehensive repository of all available services, all that remains to set the plan into action is finding our volunteers! If you are interested in helping these brave women, please register for one of our upcoming training sessions by contacting Customer Service Specialist Stephanie Cosmas at 512-929-1225 or scosmas@centex.redcross.org.  

Military Veteran Support Orientations are currently scheduled:

Tuesday 9/6, 6-7pm & Thursday 9/8, 6-9pm

OR 

Saturday 9/10, 9am – 1pm

Please join us to support our veterans and help our neighbors in need. Your support is vital to the success of this program.

From the Interns' Desk

By Narya Nosrati and Taylor Reed

 

Being a summer intern at the American Red Cross has lots of perks, and one of them is getting to hang out with these guys.  We've spent a lot of time cleaning and caring for our manikin friends, but after wrapping up our First Aid/CPR/AED Instructor Training we thought they needed a coffee break. Throughout the training course they, along with our wonderful instructor Fred, prepared us with the skills and materials we needed to become certified instructors. 

When we finished Instructor Training, we knew our work as interns at the Red Cross would never be the same. In addition to working in the office, we are now armed with the tools necessary to make a real impact in our community. Aside from refining our basic First Aid and CPR skills, we had the opportunity to grow as leaders. With this new found confidence, we are more determined and able than ever to carry out the mission of the American Red Cross. The information we will be teaching in our CPR/First Aid/AED classes is invaluable, and the more people we can reach out to the better our community as a whole will be able to prevent, prepare for and respond to an emergency.  This fact alone makes all of our studying and work well worth it. We hope that with each class we teach, we can give a few more Austinites the knowledge and confidence to tackle whatever situation life may throw their way. 

Signup for a class today so we can share these life-saving skills with you! Besides, who wouldn’t want to get up close and personal with these guys?