Many students and teachers at San Luis Obispo High School don’t understand the fact that firefighters don’t just fight fires. Yes, although it is in the name there are many other public safety issues that people have to deal with, and that is where your first responders come in. When you ask someone, “Who comes when there is a fire?” people will most likely say the firefighters. But what if you asked, “Who comes when your car gets broken into”? And most people would reply, “the police department”. But who comes when your grandma falls out of bed at 2 a.m. or when your mom goes into cardiac arrest? Sometimes it is just pure ignorance or blatant uninterest, but being genuinely educated on the people who serve our community is a skill that will help you when there is an emergency.

  Firefighters and Firefighter Paramedics work 24-hour shifts for multiple days or weeks at a time. Yes, they spend the night at the fire station, don’t get to come home at 5 p.pm. like a normal job, and constantly miss holidays with family because someone has to be there when your grandma burns the Thanksgiving turkey and sets the smoke alarm off. Many students at SLOHS are related to, have seen, or have had a personal experience with the San Luis Obispo City Fire Department or another form of our first responders in some way or another. The SLO City Fire Department runs calls for our homeless population, elderly, pregnant, the sick, even our own SLOHS students, and many more.

   The group of ignorant and uneducated people of this community who don’t understand the complexity and range of what firefighters do need to understand the constant battle from being flipped off in grocery stores while in uniform to using the “jaws of life” to extricate a family in a life or death situation. Our firefighters and first responders do a lot for this community and it’s time we start realizing and teaching that.