Charles City teacher develops new school safety curriculum

By Travis Fischer, tkfischer@charlescitypress.com

The Charles City School District will be utilizing a new curriculum program to teach students about safety. While the district uses a variety of curricula for all kinds of subjects, the “Safety Strong” program is unique in that it was developed locally.

Created by Ingri Tutu, who has lived in Charles City since 2015 and started working as a special education teacher in the high school this year, Safety Strong is a safety curriculum that provides instruction and materials for teachers to use when teaching students about how to recognize and respond to a variety of dangers.

Developed for K-6 students, the curriculum covers a wide range of topics, teaching students how to recognize dangers, be aware of their surroundings and how to calmly respond during emergency situations.

From safe behavior when riding the bus to knowing what to do in the event of an active shooter, the curriculum helps students develop skills and habits that can be applied in both every day situations and extreme events.

“I started with an all-hazards approach,” said Tutu. “They know what to do if there ever is an emergency or crisis.”

Tutu was inspired to develop her own curriculum program back in 2012, experiencing for herself the issues in training and communication that teachers have come across as the education system has adapted to incidents like the Sandy Hook shooting.

“Schools were doing some safety training, but it wasn’t as prevalent as it is now,” said Tutu. “The need has greatly increased.”

Tutu spent years conducting research and attending seminars, studying not only the best strategies of keeping students safe, but also strategies on how to effectively teach students those strategies.

“You want to find something that’s developmentally appropriate that’s not going to scare or threaten them,” said Tutu.

The program includes materials and activities for a range of ages. Songs and dances, headbands and a “Safety Sam” puppet are all part of the package to help communicate safety lessons to young children in a way they can understand.

Beyond providing teaching materials for students, the curriculum also includes instruction for the teachers themselves, providing information on how they, too, should respond in an emergency, aligning the curriculum with the statewide mandate for an emergency operations plan.

The curriculum even provides scripted scenarios to help teachers with subjects they may not be familiar with, as some teachers may be more comfortable instructing their students in long division than they are life-and-death situations.

“If the teacher is uncomfortable, the dialogue is provided for them,” said Tutu.

With a background specializing in student behavior, Tutu has also incorporated social-emotional learning into the curriculum, combining practical safety protocols with strategies to improve the everyday behavior of students.

“I’ve integrated social-emotional learning concepts that really focuses on anti-bullying and unifying the school as a learning body,” said Tutu. “When you have that, just as a whole, you have a safer environment.”

From teaching students the difference between “telling” and “tattling,” to helping them develop conflict resolution techniques, incorporating the social-emotional learning aspect into the safety curriculum can help teachers and students mitigate problems before they become dangerous, she said.

“A lot of it is preventive measures and how to recognize alarming behaviors,” said Tutu.

The curriculum package comes with dedicated books meant for administrators, teachers, students, and parents, which can be used throughout the year to keep kids fresh and reinforce good habits.

Tutu began putting the Safety Smart books together in 2018 and was just about ready to launch her product before the COVID-19 pandemic upended the priorities of school safety.

“The areas of concern shifted greatly,” she said.

Once students began moving back to the classroom, Tutu renewed her efforts to launch the curriculum. More of a teacher than a business woman, Tutu hasn’t done much in the way of marketing or advertising, but has managed to sell her curriculum to a few schools both locally and out-of-state.

While Tutu has long appreciated seeing the efforts of her work reflected in her students, seeing students and teachers alike utilizing the curriculum she’s developed is a uniquely satisfying experience, she said.

“It makes everything worth it. All the time and the research and everything I’ve done,” said Tutu. “It’s very rewarding to know that it has a positive impact on people’s lives.”