FLORISSANT, Mo. — The Florissant Valley Fire Protection District hosted a Junior Fire Camp Saturday in hopes of training the next generation of first responders.
Kate Freshman, with Florissant Valley Fire Protection District, said the hands-on camp gave teenagers a taste of what a career as a firefighter or paramedic would look like.
"It's really important that we put on camps like this one because we want to get early exposure to the kids on the fire service," she said.
A job that isn't traditional, according to Freshman, but life changing.
"Being a firefighter paramedic is very unique. You have a school portion and then you have a hands-on portion, so being able to know the stuff and then put it to practice is so important," she said.
The camp was for boys and girls, ages 13 to 18, to learn tools and skills firefighters and paramedics use daily.
The mission behind the camp, Freshman said, is to inspire and empower young adults.
"They're doing forcible entry, they're doing hose deployment, vehicle extrication, CPR. Then, they're also doing search and rescue in our training house," she said.
The idea came from the women's camp Freshman's firehouse hosts yearly. She said they wanted to give teenagers who may be interested in putting on a suit that same opportunity.
"The kids are excited. They're very eager to get their hands on the tools and try out different skills," she said.
Nearly 40 instructors helped 30 kids see what a life dedicated to helping your neighbors looks like, according to Freshman.
"It's really nice to have a variety of instructors within the Florissant Valley because they can show them different ways of doing things, different techniques to make it a unique experience for each kid," she said.
Freshman said the hands-on experience also impacts the department.
"We do try to use this as a recruiting tool just so they can see what we do here at our firehouse and the variety of people that you could help," she said.
Most importantly though, it helps train future first responders.
"Getting them in early is so important because then they can see, 'Oh I can do this and I can grow' or 'I struggled with this. Now, I know what to work on so I can do this field later in life,'" Freshman said.
After such a great turnout for its first year, Freshman said, the Florissant Valley Fire Protection District hopes to do the Junior Fire Camp again next year.