Ludlow Fire participates in the Student Awareness of Fire Education (SAFE) and the Senior SAFE program and partners with Ludlow Public Schools and the Ludlow Council on Aging, to provide life safety information and fire education to children and older adults.
The Student Awareness of Fire Education (SAFE) program provides grants to local fire departments to teach fire and life safety to children in schools. The program teaches students to recognize the dangers of fire and the fire hazards of tobacco products through 23 key fire safety behaviors taught in developmentally appropriate ways. Fire and life safety is easy to combine with math, science, language arts, and health or physical education lessons, making it easy to collaborate with school teachers. Since the S.A.F.E. program began in 1996, child fire deaths have dropped significantly in Massachusetts. In 2021, Massachusetts marked two and a half years without a child fire fatality, the longest period in the Commonwealth’s recorded history.
The Senior SAFE program targets seniors within the community and aims to educate older adults about the importance of smoke and CO alarm safety, installation of house numbers, and nightlights, replacing alarm batteries, and more.
The S.A.F.E. and Senior SAFE Programs provide $1.9 million through the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security to local fire departments. The programs are administered by the state’s Department of Fire Services.
To learn more about the Massachusetts Department of Fire Services’ SAFE program, click here.