Hanover Fire Department Receives $40,000 Community Compact Grant 10/3/22

The Hanover Fire Department is excited to announce it has been awarded a $40,000 grant through the Massachusetts Executive Office of Administration and Finance Community Compact Program. This grant will provide funding for the Department to collaborate with the South Shore Technical High School to implement a fire training program for students interested in a career in the fire and emergency services field.

The Town of Hanover, and specifically its fire department, has a great working relationship with the South Shore Technical High School, located in Hanover, which has culminated in a multitude of successful collaborative and innovative programs in the past. This newest endeavor will leverage the relationship between the school and the fire department once again to solve a problem; a declining number of interested and qualified individuals to fill vacancies at area fire departments. 

The South Shore Technical High School is looking to implement and launch a new evening school program that will ultimately offer a pathway to providing high school students with basic firefighting skills along with the potential for Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) training and certification. Combined with the existing vocational educational opportunities, graduates will be highly interested and possess valuable skills necessary and desired by fire departments to be employed as firefighters. This new program would be geared toward high school students, specifically at South Shore Technical but also Hanover High School, and could also be available for adults looking for a career change and who are unable to find training opportunities elsewhere.

Funds from this grant will enable Hanover Fire Department and the school to offer an 8-10 week orientation program aimed at freshmen, sophomores, and juniors who may be interested in the evening school program but are unclear about what is involved in being a firefighter and EMT. Instruction will include both classroom and hands-on training that will provide students the ability to immerse themselves into what the fire and emergency medical services field are about.

A student participating in the 8-10 week orientation program will be provided with basic firefighting knowledge and information about the fire service in general. Hands-on practical components will provide each student with a true sense of some of the physical demands placed on firefighters. Further, each student will be provided with CPR and basic first aid training as part of this orientation program; skills that will benefit each of them regardless of what they do in the future.

Once complete, students will be able to accurately judge their personal desire to continue seeking opportunities in the fire and emergency medical services field. After the orientation program, a student may decide that the fire and emergency medical profession is not a field they would like to pursue. Those who remain interested will be offered the opportunity to be placed in the newly created fire program at the South Shore Technical High School which is being planned to start next year.

While the Hanover Fire Department is directly working with the School during this implementation phase, future education and training will be a combined effort between all of the area fire departments in the South Shore Technical High School District including but not limited to Abington, Cohasset, Hanson, Norwell, Rockland, Scituate and Whitman.