marissaalanis

When you think about what a PTA or PTO does, your mind probably goes to the familiar and meaningful efforts that help a school feel vibrant, supported, and connected. From planning extracurricular activities and leading campus beautification projects to chaperoning field trips and school events, parent organizations have a long history of making the school experience better for both students and teachers. Their work is an essential support system for schools that are often asked to do more with less.

That said, there are some parts of school operations that often fall outside the focus of many PTOs, areas that could really benefit from their help. One of the most important areas is health and safety services.

It makes sense that many parents assume schools already get enough support from governing bodies, when it comes to student health. But the reality can be very different. In many places, resources haven’t kept up with what schools are expected to provide, and that’s put real strain on the system.

Over the past few decades, the role of the school nurse has expanded significantly. These days, they’re responsible for much more than treating scrapes or handing out medication. According to the School Nursing Practice Framework, their responsibilities now include coordinating physical and mental health care, leading campus-wide programs, advocating for health services at the district level, developing emergency response plans, and that’s just the beginning.

Even with all these responsibilities, school health staff are often under-resourced. Many schools only have access to a nurse part-time or share one across several campuses, according to the National Association of School Nurses and JAMA Health Forum. That means a single nurse may be responsible for hundreds or even thousands of students across multiple schools. Looking ahead, experts predict that school funding will continue to suffer due to enrollment declines, which could stretch these services even thinner.

This lack of funding and staffing doesn’t just affect students’ day-to-day experiences; it can become a real safety issue during emergencies. Depending on the situation, some schools have teams dedicated to creating and practicing emergency plans. But in certain cases, including some health-related crises, the responsibility can fall entirely on the school nurse. And with everything already on their plate, there’s no guarantee that nursing staff have the bandwidth to create comprehensive plans, resources to execute them, or ability to be present when the emergency occurs. This can be disastrous when it affects preparedness for emergencies like Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA).

SCA can happen without warning, even to children who seem perfectly healthy. Each year, one in twenty-five high schools experiences an SCA on campus according to the American College of Cardiology. If there’s no clear plan, no equipment on hand, and no one trained to respond quickly, the results can be devastating.

There are far too many real-life examples where students’ lives were lost because schools weren’t prepared. In Adam Lemel’s case, there was no AED available. For Brock Ruether, there was an AED on site, but no one nearby knew how to use it. These are tragedies that might have been prevented with better support and resources. But with ongoing funding challenges at the state and federal level, schools often have to look elsewhere for support or try to make do.

This is where PTOs can play a powerful role. These groups are in a unique position to help schools close the gap in health emergency preparedness, using the same skills and approaches they already apply in other areas of campus life.

By working with the school staff who manage emergency planning, PTOs can help ease the burden. That might mean raising funds for critical equipment, helping coordinate emergency drills under the direction of school staff, bringing in training experts, or partnering with science-based organizations like the American Heart Association. PTOs can also be strong advocates for policy change, working at the district or state level to ensure schools meet consistent standards or get the funding they need.

Getting involved in something as serious as emergency planning requires the right approach. The first step is to have an open, respectful conversation with your school’s leadership. Let them know your PTO is interested in helping improve the school’s readiness for health emergencies. Ask who currently oversees that planning. It might be the principal, the nurse, or a team of staff.

Once you’ve connected, find out what’s already in place and where your PTO or PTA could be helpful. Some schools may have strong plans but need help keeping them updated or putting them into action. Others may be getting started and would welcome a partner to help build things from the ground up.

Throughout the process, it’s important to show appreciation for the professionals involved, especially the school nurse. These individuals carry a heavy load often with limited support. A constructive goal should be to lighten that load, not question their expertise. Approach the conversation with curiosity and a shared sense of purpose. Instead of focusing on what’s missing, ask what’s needed. See where your group can be most helpful and look for ways to support the school in a meaningful and collaborative way.

For your first joint project, it can be helpful to choose one that already has a strong foundation and a clear path to impact. A great place to start is with Sudden Cardiac Arrest.
The American Heart Association recommends that every school have a Cardiac Emergency Response Plan (CERP): a written, practiced plan for how to respond to cardiac emergencies quickly and effectively. Schools that have a CERP in place see up to a 50% higher survival rate when cardiac arrests happen on campus , and this is an area where your PTA or PTO can help make a real difference.

The American Heart Association offers free tools and resources to support CERP development, and our team also works directly with schools to create customized plans based on their layout, staff, and student needs. We can assist with training, equipment guidance, and even help with implementation logistics.

If you’d like to explore how we can support your school in building or strengthening a CERP, just fill out the short form below to start the conversation.

The school nursing position has become more complex as learning environments have evolved over time. Today their role extends far beyond bandaging scrapes or handing out medications. According to the School Nursing Practice Framework, expectations include care coordination across physical and mental health, leadership of campus-wide programs and district-wide health advocacy, development and coordination of emergency response plans, and that just scratches the surface. Their impact is apparent on campus and even outside the school, as every dollar spent on school nursing saves society two dollars and twenty cents according to the CDC.

However, the scope and importance of their role are often mismatched with the resources they are given. Budget constraints and limited funding have made full-time nurses a luxury in many school districts, not a standard. Nationally, 35% of schools operate with part-time nursing staff. In western states, it’s at a whopping 51%. In many instances, nurses are shared across several campuses due to funding constraints. In Texas, 30% of school nurses operate across multiple campuses Texas Department of State Health Services. As a result, these staff are stretched thin, responsible for hundreds or even thousands of students across multiple sites.

It’s clear school nurses do a lot, and they can’t always be at the right place when needed, especially when shared by multiple sites or operating part-time. This is a challenge in the context of health emergencies, which are notoriously unpredictable and can happen anywhere at any time. The American College of Cardiology puts the chances of sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) in a high school campus at 1 in 25 . Part of the school nurse’s job is developing and coordinating the execution of school emergency response plans. But what happens if the nurse isn’t there to handle the emergency? In the cases of Brock Ruether and Adam Lemel, low bystander/faculty awareness led to tragic outcomes.

So how do we address these challenges? Fire emergency response faces many of the same types of challenges as described above, but schools have implemented plans and highly structured divisions of responsibilities to create smooth experiences that minimize the chances of complications. One faculty member, maybe a principal or nurse, isn’t responsible for everything. There’s a school emergency response team (SERT) ready to distribute the load. The leader might design the plan, and coordinate the drills, but they can trust their team to act when the time comes.

By leveraging the same principles and design ideas, your school nurse can have their expertise and impact multiplied by leading a cardiac emergency response team. This structure benefits everyone involved. For the nurse, it lightens the immediate burden and reduces stress, knowing there’s a trained, responsive team in place. Faculty and staff gain confidence from clear roles and practice scenarios. Most importantly, the student experiencing the emergency receives faster, more coordinated care.

In the case of cardiac arrest, this approach is formalized in what’s called a Cardiac Emergency Response Plan (CERP). A CERP outlines a step-by-step protocol for how a school community should respond during a cardiac event. It includes designated roles, communication flow, AED locations, training schedules, and regular drills to ensure readiness.

Some states have already mandated CERPs as part of school safety regulations, and that list is growing every year. If your school isn’t yet required to implement a CERP, it’s still worth exploring. Being proactive in developing a response plan can bridge the gap between staffing limitations and lifesaving readiness.
Developing and implementing a CERP may sound like a significant undertaking, especially for schools already managing limited resources. Fortunately, help is available. The American Heart Association offers free tools and templates to guide school nurses and principals in creating and maintaining an effective Cardiac Emergency Response Plan. These resources include checklists, role assignment tools, training guides, and communication templates to simplify the process.

For schools looking for more hands-on support, the American Heart Association also provides expert-led services that can take the pressure off your administrative team. These services allow your staff to focus on what matters most, caring for students, while ensuring your school is ready for cardiac emergencies with a professionally developed and supported plan.

In the end, school safety depends on more than alarms and drills, it hinges on having skilled, prepared individuals in place for every type of emergency, especially health-related ones. By recognizing the crucial role school nurses play, providing them with the support they need, and implementing team-based response systems like CERPs, schools can dramatically increase their ability to protect students when it matters most.
Not sure where your school stands in terms of emergency preparedness? The Heart Association offers a quick quiz to assess your readiness. It’s a simple but effective way to identify gaps, celebrate strengths, and make informed decisions about how to move forward.

By Gina Mayfield

Four hours after a new colleague arrived for his first day on the job with Buckhead Meat Co., he took a seat in the sales manager’s office for training. Just a few minutes later, the manager noticed his new hire had slumped over in his seat. “Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!” the manager started to yell, which alerted others in the area that something wasn’t quite right.

Diane Mazza, who happened to be nearby, passed the office, glanced in and instinctively knew to quickly grab the AED. When she returned, things had not improved. “He was still not moving. He had a blue hue to him,” she says. “I asked the sales manager and another bystander to put him on the ground.” She began CPR. “I figured I needed to get blood flowing to his brain. That’s all I’m thinking, I’ve got to get air into his lungs,” she recalls.

Diane could hear the 911 call in the background as she ripped off the man’s shirt, which revealed a large scar clearly indicating a surgical incision over his heart. Still, the 911 operator gave her permission to immediately began chest compressions and breaths. “I didn’t check for a pulse because I wasn’t sure if I could find it. My adrenaline was out of control,” Diane says. “I was going to just keep doing CPR until help arrived, because nobody wants to die at work.”

That help arrived in a coworker, Carmen Christeleit, who opened the AED. “I put on the pads and shocked him twice. We got nothing,” Diane says. Diane and Katie Carbone, another coworker who had stepped in to help, took turns performing CPR while a crowd had gathered just outside the windowed office willing their new colleague to just breathe.  

EMTs arrived in record speed and unloaded their AED. When asked if they wanted to take over, the EMTs responded that Diane and Katie were “doing a great job” and finished prepping their AED. An EMT soon took over CPR, while Katie continued breaths. Once the AED was set up, they administered a shock. The colleague jolted and looked up at Katie. “I called his name and he looked at me again, which was a great sign. He knew his name and what direction to look. He finally woke up,” she says.

EMTs loaded the survivor into the ambulance, but he lost consciousness again, then came back around and began speaking coherently. With lights and sirens, the ambulance took off for John F. Kennedy University Medical Center in Edison, New Jersey. But, come to find out, the survivor lived about an hour and a half away in Pennsylvania and was training to expand the sales territory in that direction.

Patricia Benjamin, another colleague, stayed with the survivor in the hospital as his wife, back in Pennsylvania, quickly worked the phones to arrange for medical transport. He continued to improve. “He was up, he was pink, which was fabulous to see, but I had never even met him before that moment,” Patricia says. “His personal belongings hadn’t made their way to him, he didn’t have his glasses, and he didn’t know anybody. We quickly became friends.”

The colleague, in his late 50s, knew that without his rescuers the call to his family would have gone very differently for his two young sons, aged 10 and 12. “He was very, very emotional and very thankful,” Patricia says. “Turned out that he had a pacemaker that did not have a defibrillator attached to it. Needless to say, it does now. But that was the thing, the pacemaker couldn’t restart without the defibrillator.”

Before being transported back home, the survivor jokingly told the nurse on duty that he felt like the luckiest man alive and was going to play the lottery numbers 5/20 for the rest of his life, referring to the date of his rescue. “Don’t be greedy,” she quipped with a smile. “You just won the lottery of life.”

Truth be told, he was extraordinarily fortunate to have been surrounded by trained rescuers at the moment of his cardiac arrest, and not alone at home as he was in the days leading up to his new job.

Buckhead Meat Co., a division of Sysco Food Service, offers regular on-site CPR training at no cost to employees and ensures people from each area of the building participate. Katie had attended a recent session that she says made a real impact. “It was the first time I’ve had formal CPR training, so obviously I’m very grateful that we were given that opportunity through Sysco because the training was fantastic. The mankin provided helpful feedback regarding rate and depth of compressions. The training definitely made a difference in this outcome.”

The AHA is committed to transforming a nation of bystanders into a Nation of Lifesavers. Join the movement that can make a difference in the life of someone’s partner, parent, friend, or family.

By Gina Mayfield

One evening after work, as Ingrid Zuniga Izquierdo relaxed in the living room of her multigenerational home, her sister was bathing her 1-year-old daughter, Leslie, who had been fighting some chest congestion. After a vapor bath, Leslie was halfway through a diaper change when she let out a little whimper and turned purple. Ingrid’s sister scooped up Leslie and went screaming to the living room.

“My niece was purple, she was like a rag doll, she had no motion,” Ingrid says, “She was choking. She wasn’t breathing. My sister was panicking.” Ingrid, who has children of her own with respiratory issues, was ready. “I’ve taken CPR classes, so I know the drill. You go into that mode and do what you.” she says. Ingrid placed Leslie on the floor and immediately started child CPR, with compressions and breaths, while her sister called 911.

By this point, three generations of the family had gathered around. “The kids were crying as they were seeing what was going on, my mom too, everybody was just panicking. I was just in that mindset of ‘Okay, I have no time to panic. Either I’m going to do something about this, or it’s not going to end well.’” Ingrid says. “I was able to get Leslie to come out of it. As soon as she took her first breath, her color started to come back.”

Soon after, the EMTs arrived, assessed Leslie and took her to the ER where the doctor told Ingrid’s sister, if Ingrid hadn’t administered CPR, they would be dealing with a “completely different story” due to oxygen deprivation and what that does to the brain.

Leslie spent the night in the hospital and her parents got to take her home the next day. While doctors are still running tests to determine the full story, they suspect a contributing factor was phlegm from chest congestion that blocked Leslie’s airways.

“I told my sister, ‘I’m glad I was around. What would you have done? Leslie needed air, she needed help,’” Ingrid says.

“This whole experience was such an eye opener, it motivated my whole family to learn CPR. My mom doesn’t know much English, so my parents went to El Concilio, the Hispanic American Council, and they taught them to do CPR. I tell people not to allow a language barrier to stop them from learning CPR, you could save a life. I’m even teaching my 9-year-old daughter,” Ingrid says.

“People tend not to worry about things until they happen to them. But you never know when you’re going to need CPR,” Ingrid says. “I’m so thankful Leslie’s still here.”