7A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2017
Drill: Weather led to cancellation of tsunami evacuation route walk
Continued from Page 1A
dived under and clutched on
as the warning announcement
came over the loudspeaker.
Seaside School District is one
of 580,000 organizations reg-
istered for the 2017 Great Ore-
gon ShakeOut, a worldwide
event that encourages partic-
ipants to practice earthquake
preparedness techniques .
This is the second year
schools in Seaside — vulner-
able to the Cascadia Subduc-
tion Zone — have performed
the drill . Like last year, the
drill was also supposed to be
paired with a tsunami evacua-
tion route walk, but was can-
cel ed due to safety concerns
associated with rainy weather
and high wind warnings.
“As one of the four schools
in Oregon within the inunda-
tion zone, it is critical to be
prepared. Failing to prepare
is preparing for failure,” Sea-
side High School Principal Jeff
Roberts said. “While we hope
there’s not an event like this,
we want to know students can
respond appropriately.”
One of the main concerns
in Seaside is whether certain
roads and bridges that lead
people to higher ground will
be intact in the event of a major
earthquake and tsunami. But
from Roberts’ point of view,
the school district is doing all
Students at Seaside High School watch a presentation
about earthquake safety guidelines.
Photos by Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Students at Seaside High School crawl under a table on Thursday during the annual Great
ShakeOut earthquake drill.
that it can to be prepared.
“We can’t change infra-
structure issues. We can’t
rebuild bridges. All we can
do is educate and prepare our
kids to know how to respond,”
he said. “The best thing we
can do is move the kids out of
danger to the new school site,
which doesn’t change how we
prepare, but is overall a better
plan.”
For Kruger, knowing a
new school campus out of the
inundation zone is on its way
is a major source of relief as a
teacher.
“We are prepared, but no
matter what we do it is going
to be chaotic getting that many
kids to safety,” she said.
Kruger has taught for Sea-
side School District since
2003. She said a day hasn’t
passed where she hasn’t con-
sidered how a seismic event
would affect her and her two
daughters.
When she goes to bed, she
takes mental notes of where
she leaves her glasses and her
shoes in case she needs to evac-
uate in the middle of the night.
She thinks about how she
would connect with her daugh-
ters if a disaster happened
while they were separated.
“Thinking about these
things is half the reason I
run — to prepare,” she said,
laughing.
When Kruger is teaching
her students how to prepare for
a seismic event, she thinks of
her own children and what she
would want them to know.
“All of these kids are some-
one else’s beloved child,” Kru-
ger said. “I just hope to com-
municate what they need to
know to be safe.”
The drill itself was rela-
tively lighthearted in the class-
room. Students giggled to
fi ll the silence as they had to
scrunch together under their
small tables.
But Kruger said her stu-
dents know what is at stake .
“There was a lot of dis-
cussion about disasters when
the school was trying to pass
a bond for the new cam-
pus,” Kruger said. “Some stu-
dents came out of that as a lit-
tle fatalistic — if it’s going to
happen, it’s going to happen.
But there’s another strand,
like the ASB (Associated Stu-
dent Body) students who really
energized the effort to do this
drill. A lot of them were think-
ing of their younger siblings at
school in the inundation zone.
They were thinking about
keeping them safe.”
Schools: Goal is around 10 percent Dogs: Stars on Instagram visited pool
Continued from Page 1A
“I think we need to get
ourselves around 10 per-
cent,” Hoppes said of his
goal for the district’s chronic
absenteeism .
At a school board meet-
ing Nov. 8, he said, admin-
istrators from each school
will discuss strategies used
to improve attendance. Hop-
pes will talk about the atten-
dance policies of other school
districts.
Statewide, the number
of chronically absent stu-
dents has continually crept up
from 17.4 percent a few years
ago to nearly 20 percent last
school year.
The state is implement-
ing a chronic absenteeism
plan, including $7.4 mil-
lion invested in the two-year
budget by the Legislature to
improve attendance and grad-
uation rates.
The Legislature has also
invested $170 million in
Measure 98, passed by vot-
ers last year to expand dual-
credit and career-technical
courses and dropout preven-
tion in high school.
“We know that students
who attend school regu-
larly have more opportunity
to learn, so tracking chronic
absenteeism is critical,” said
acting state Deputy Superin-
tendent Colt Gill in a state-
ment . “There is a direct link
between high instances of
chronic absenteeism and low
graduation rates. This is why
chronic absenteeism is one
of our school accountabil-
ity measures in our Oregon
Plan for the Every Student
Succeeds Act and why Gov.
(Kate) Brown and the Legis-
lature have invested in pro-
grams to address the issue.”
Continued from Page 1A
Emma Starr stood with
4 -month-old puppy Drake, get-
ting a quick towel dry between
swims. “He’s a little hesitant,
but he likes it,” Starr said.
Paul and Stephanie Buff-
ington brought Jamie, a gold-
en doodle, and Ginger, a golden
retriever puppy. The dogs skil-
fully navigated the deep end
taking turns gracefully balanc-
ing a jolly ball. “We had a pool
when we lived in California
so they love the water,” Paul
Buffi ngton said.
The Buffi ngtons, recent
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Several dozen dogs and their
owners showed up at the
Sunset Empire Recreational
Center in Seaside on Thurs-
day for the dog swim event.
arrivals to Gearhart, have an
Instagram account with nearly
57,000 followers. Their dogs
are the stars.
“We do a lot of their story
and their interaction with peo-
ple,” Buffi ngton said. “When
we saw what was going on, we
wanted to be down here.”
Lifeguard Amanda Brown-
ing stood watch over the just
slightly controlled chaos.
“Right now, I am mainly
keeping an eye on the humans,”
Browning said. “When they’re
in the water with the animals,
sometimes the animals get
scared and climb on top of
them.”
Any special training need
to lifeguard for a doggy swim?
“Just common sense,” she
said. “Do my thing.”
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