Evi Widowati, Anik Setyo Wahyuningsih, Lutfi Muzaqi, Ummi Nur Laila Sulistyani, Fitra Aulia Rahma, Risa Anggita Putri, Hanif Satria Febriananda

Increasing Safety Awareness as an Effort to Build Preparedness in Disaster-Prone Schools

Introduction

Increasing safety awareness as an effort to build preparedness in disaster-prone schools. Enhance disaster preparedness in Indonesian schools, a vulnerable area. This study explores safety awareness, the sister school program, and student protection for effective disaster mitigation.

Abstract

Geologically, Indonesia is located at the confluence of three large plates: Indo-Australian, Eurasian, and Pacific. It passes through two of the world's main volcanic routes, making it a disaster-prone area. As a result, Indonesia has many active volcanoes, including Mount Merapi. In disaster conditions, students are a vulnerable group, both physically and psychosocially, due to disruption to the learning process and potential trauma. Efforts to increase preparedness through implementing the sister school program, namely cooperation between affected and buffer schools, are urgently needed. However, the implementation of this program in Magelang Regency is still not optimal, especially in its integration into the sister village program, so that vulnerability to disasters during school hours remains high. The solution implemented is to help schools increase their preparedness capacity. The results showed increased participants' understanding of the concepts, benefits and roles of buffer and affected schools in the disaster mitigation framework. Therefore, efforts are still needed to develop affected and buffer schools integrated into disaster-resilient villages.

Review

This paper addresses a critically important and highly relevant topic: increasing safety awareness and preparedness in disaster-prone schools, particularly within the geologically vulnerable context of Indonesia. The abstract effectively highlights the severe risks faced by students, identifying them as a particularly vulnerable demographic during disasters, both physically and psychosocially. It correctly pinpoints the urgent need for preparedness strategies, specifically mentioning the "sister school program" as a promising but currently underperforming initiative in Magelang Regency, leading to persistent high vulnerability during school hours. This sets a clear and compelling problem statement for the research. The proposed solution focuses on directly enhancing the preparedness capacity of schools, which is a sensible approach given the identified gaps. The abstract states that this effort resulted in an increased understanding among participants regarding the concepts, benefits, and roles of both affected and buffer schools within the broader disaster mitigation framework. This immediate outcome suggests a positive step towards knowledge acquisition and theoretical groundwork for improved preparedness. The focus on a local context, Magelang Regency, also offers valuable insights into specific regional challenges and implementation hurdles. While the initial reported outcome of increased understanding is valuable, the abstract leaves some key methodological details ambiguous, particularly concerning *how* the schools' preparedness capacity was increased. Further elaboration on the specific interventions, training modules, or activities would strengthen the perceived impact. Furthermore, the abstract acknowledges that the sister school program's implementation remains sub-optimal and poorly integrated with sister village programs, indicating that while knowledge may have increased, practical, systemic preparedness still requires significant development. The call for continued efforts to integrate schools into disaster-resilient villages correctly identifies the broader, long-term challenge. The full paper should ideally detail these interventions, discuss the barriers to optimal implementation more thoroughly, and present data beyond just "increased understanding" to demonstrate more tangible progress in actual preparedness or reduced vulnerability.

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