An invaluable community service to make our schools safer I Heroes.pdf · not only a whole new line...
Transcript of An invaluable community service to make our schools safer I Heroes.pdf · not only a whole new line...
THERE’S PROBABLY NO ONE IN OUR JEWISH COM-
munity unfamiliar with Hugo Paluch; no
one who wasn’t touched by how this four-
teen-year-old boy tragically died from in-
juries sustained by a freak accident at
school or how the community pulled to-
gether as one to daven for Hugo and to
provide emotional and physical support
for his family. It wasn’t just the Johannes-
burg Jewish community either, as his sto-
ry has truly gone global - incredibly, so
widespread is his impact that a Google
search for the name “Hugo” still automati-
cally brings up “Hugo Paluch” as the
fourth suggestion.
While many wonderful words have al-
ready been said about Hugo, it’s hard to
think of a more � tting tribute to the
young man who was beloved by so many
than a brand new programme launched by
Hatzolah that is speci� cally tailored to en-
sure that what happened to Hugo never
happens again to another child at school
or on a school outing – or, at the very
least, to have the school properly prepared
to deal with any and all major injuries or
other health-related issues well before
professional paramedics arrive.
Hugo’s Heroes, as the programme is � t-
tingly called, consists of two complemen-
tary aspects to ensure that children are as
safe as possible while attending any of
South Africa’s Jewish day schools. � e
� rst aspect involves training two children
each from grades ten and eleven (or more
in bigger schools) in each Jewish day
school in basic � rst aid – though “basic”
might be something of an understate-
ment, as the training is a labour-law and
Netcare approved and tested Level-1 � rst-
aid course and is followed by continuous
training where the hope is to get each of
these students up to a Level-3 � rst aid by
the next year, just as the next batch of
grade 10 students join the programme.
� e second aspect of Hugo’s Heroes,
that very much goes hand-in-hand with
the � rst, is a health and safety course that
e� ectively makes students “another set of
eyes” on campus to ensure that there
aren’t any health or safety risks on school
property and to ensure that any such weak
spots are dealt with as quickly and as e� -
ciently as possible. � is side of Hugo’s He-
roes is, in fact, run by Hugo’s father, Dov
Paluch, both as a pre-emptive counterpart
to the reactive � rst-aid course, but also as
a way to ensure that Jewish day schools
70 JEWISH LIFE ISSUE 110
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FEATURE
An invaluable community service to make our schools safer I BY ILAN PRESKOVSKY
ROUGHLY ONE AND HALF YEARS AGO, YAKOV CONTACTED DR REUVEN JACKS AT HATZOLAH TO PUT A COURSE INTO
PLACE THAT WOULD TEACH STUDENTS FROM ALL THE DIFFERENT JEWISH DAY SCHOOLS BASIC FIRST AID.
LEFT TO RIGHT: Hilly Reuben, Dov Paluch, and Alon Crouse
Wishing you Health,
Happiness, Peace and
Prosperity...
Today and all
through the year.
L’Shana Tova
and Well over the Fast
not only meet the legal health and safety
requirements that all schools are supposed
to follow, but to improve upon these ulti-
mately fairly limited laws.
FOR THE STUDENTS AND BY
THE STUDENTS
Interestingly enough, the programme that
was to become Hugo’s Heroes actually was
starting to take form about a year before
Hugo’s tragic death, as a group of students
came to Hatzolah to try and work out a
programme that would put the power in
student hands to deal with any medical
emergencies that might occur on school
property.
One of the main instigators of this po-
tential new programme was Yakov Drut-
man, who is currently in grade 11 at Torah
Academy Boys High, but has had a lifelong
interest in medicine and !rst aid. A few
years ago, he joined the !rst aid course
that the King David High Schools o"er to
their students and earned a Level-3 in !rst
aid. Since qualifying, though, he started to
become more and more perturbed that the
Jewish day schools didn’t o"er basic !rst
aid training to even their senior students.
Roughly one and half years ago, Yakov
contacted Dr Reuven Jacks at Hatzolah to
put a course into place that would teach
students from all the di"erent Jewish day
schools basic !rst aid and, though Dr
Jacks immediately took to the idea and
the Hatzolah board approved it soon after,
by the time of Hugo’s accident the pro-
gramme had only just left its planning
stages. After Hugo sadly passed away, Ya-
kov approached Hatzolah’s Alon Crouse at
Hugo’s funeral and asked him not only if
the programme could be fast-tracked, but
if it could be done in Hugo’s name.
With the horrible circumstances sur-
rounding Hugo’s accident as an impetus,
Hugo’s Heroes started to quickly turn into
what it is now. Dov Paluch admits to being
“very touched that these kids wanted to in-
corporate Hugo’s name into the pro-
gramme” and was “humbled and proud to
associate Hugo’s name with the pro-
gramme” and he soon came on board to cre-
ate and oversee the second part of the Hu-
go’s Heroes programme, that of health and
safety. As well as being an incredible tribute
to their beloved son, Dov and his wife, Ni-
cole, also saw the programme as a way to
give back to a community that had done so
much for their family in what was undoubt-
edly an unimaginably di�cult time.
THE COURSE ITSELF
Both Dov and Alon Crouse are quick to
stress that this is very much only the be-
ginning of Hugo’s Heroes and that there
are plans afoot to make it an increasingly
comprehensive programme, but what is in
place already is something of a game-
changer. By putting the safety of their
schools and the health and safety of their
fellow students in their hands, those who
have trained with Hugo’s Heroes so far are
not only a whole new line of defence
against tragedies happening to children at
school, but have been empowered tremen-
dously by their new-found and critically
important responsibilities. See the sidebar
to meet two of Hugo’s Heroes and their
thoughts on the programme they were
elected to join.
!e programme is, it has to be said, very
demanding, so the students who have been
chosen for this initial phase of Hugo’s He-
roes have been chosen, to some degree, on
their physical "tness, but mostly by their
academic results to ensure that such an in-
tensive programme does not interfere with
their school work – which becomes espe-
cially pressing for those in grade 11. !e
"rst aid course itself is technically “only”
Level 1, but as Yakov Drutman puts it: “I
did a Level 3 course and, though the course
is only o�cially a Level 1 course, it’s nearly
as involved as a Level 3.”
And Yakov would know, as he has helped
with the running of the course, along with
the likes of Hilly Reuben – who also
sourced the equipment needed for the
course – and Ashira Sackstein. Others who
volunteered their valuable time to help or-
ganise the course are Avi Smith, Saul Jo-
seph, and Yehuda Goldberg. It’s because of
people like these that the "rst wave of Hu-
go’s Heroes has turned out as well as it has.
Beyond the course itself, the teenagers
of Hugo’s Heroes are constantly being giv-
en new material to learn, and each term
comes with a test on what they’ve done so
far. !e Heroes and Hatzolah remain in
close contact through email and Whatsapp
72 JEWISH LIFE ISSUE 110
MAX MARON
Hatzolah is a vital
part of our com-
munity, providing
emergency care to
all in need. !eir
role in our com-
munity should
never be under-
played or underestimated. Now,
through Hatzolah and their new ini-
tiative Hugo’s Heroes, scholars like
me are given an opportunity to make
a significant difference in our com-
munity. Getting involved with Hatzo-
lah by assisting them and our schools
is such an incredible and helpful way
of providing a basic, yet essential ser-
vice, and giving back to our commu-
nity. Hugo’s Heroes provides a level
of basic first aid that is a necessity for
all people to have, whether in school
or generally in life. !is training al-
lows Hugo’s Heroes to provide assis-
tance at our schools which relieves
some of the pressure of “unneces-
sary” calls. It can also narrow the gap
between incident and necessary as-
sistance by reducing the time be-
tween call and response. !e train-
ing, while intense, was extremely
enlightening; seeing what it takes to
be a responder; being with other
learners and all growing together. We
learned from our instructors that
Hatzolah is not only an organisation,
but a family, a family that we are now
part of. !e instructors showed us
that they were extremely committed
and passionate about their jobs as re-
sponders. I personally look up to all
of them and want to thank them all
for their services to the community.
groups, and they are constantly working
on ways to improve their knowledge and
their methodologies, even just by being
forwarded articles of breakthroughs in
� rst aid medicine.
� e � rst batch of Hugo’s Heroes have
� nished their course and are soon to grad-
uate, where they will receive their � rst aid
vests and � rst aid packs that are kept at
their respective schools. � ey are to be in
charge of the health and safety of their
schools, including the primary and nursery
schools on campus, and even accompany
school trips and Shabbatons (where they go
and collect a separate � rst aid pack from
Hatzolah so as not to deprive the schools
themselves from having it on-hand).
THE FUTUREAs noted, this really is only the beginning
of Hugo’s Heroes. � eir plans certainly
don’t stop here. Two of their biggest imme-
diate goals, for example, would certainly
take things to even higher levels than they
already are now. For a start, Dov wants to
take the health and safety side of the pro-
gramme and expand it to include not only
obvious health risks, but to tackle issues
like bullying that are health and safety
risks too – though perhaps more subtly so.
� e other major expansion to the pro-
gramme that is clearly quite vital is to ex-
pand their training beyond the students
selected to be Hugo’s Heroes and make
sure that all students and, most impor-
tantly, teachers, have some knowledge of
� rst aid and that they can all participate
in looking out for the health and safety of
their schools. Obviously, funds are an is-
sue for all Jewish day schools – especially
for the smaller ones – so the roll-out will
have to be gradual, but plans are already
in place to do so.
It’s also obviously not going to be the
case that every child of every age at every
school will be given anywhere near the
kind of extensive and intensive training
that the Hugo’s Heroes students receive,
but one of the major end goals of Hugo’s
Heroes is to ensure that no student
should � nish school without some basic
knowledge in how to deal with a medical
emergency. No less importantly, teachers,
who are e! ectively in charge of your kids
while they’re at school, should really know
basic � rst aid.
Both Alon Crouse and Dov Paluch stress
that these are not pipe dreams, but are in
active development and will hopefully start
going into practice as early as the begin-
ning of next year. � ey are also just as
quick to stress that they are still learning as
they go on and hope to improve the pro-
gramme continuously, making it more ex-
pansive and more e! ective at every turn.
All this, of course, relies heavily on the
support of the community – which, they
are very quick to point out, has been tre-
mendous so far – but as even this early
version of Hugo’s Heroes has shown that
Hugo Paluch’s, z”l, name looks set to be a
banner of crucial community services for
many, many more years to come. JL
To ! nd out more about this
amazing project, please visit
www.hatzolah.co.za/hugosheroes.
74 JEWISH LIFE ISSUE 110
NAOMI MAZABOWWhen I volun-
teered to be one of
Hugo’s Heroes, I
was a bit unsure of
my decision. Was
this the way I
wanted to spend
the last day of my
holidays? Would I be able to handle the
responsibility? What strengthened my
decision was the fact that this course is
dedicated to Hugo Paluch. I didn’t
know Hugo personally, but from all of
the stories that I’ve heard, I feel like I
did, and I wanted to do something in
his memory. Knowing that I have been
given the skills to save a life has given
me a sense of responsibility and em-
powerment. ! ere was also a strong
emphasis on prevention through a
workshop with Dov Paluch. We were
taught in that workshop to look out
for the things that cause dangerous
situations in the fi rst place. I realised
through this workshop how many in-
juries can be prevented by noticing
seemingly small things, eg: tree
stumps and nails. ! e course itself was
run brilliantly. ! e paramedics were
enthusiastic, answering all questions
in detail and with patience. What
struck me after doing the course was
how it has defi ned our community in a
way that’s diff erent from other com-
munities: we pull together in times of
tragedy and, from the midst of the
pain, we build something positive and
we make a change. For me, that was
the biggest lesson: When something
happens, don’t just move on, do some-
thing about it, empower others, and
THOSE WHO HAVE TRAINED WITH HUGO’S HEROES SO FAR ARE NOT ONLY A WHOLE NEW LINE OF DEFENCE AGAINST
TRAGEDIES HAPPENING TO CHILDREN AT SCHOOL, BUT HAVE BEEN EMPOWERED TREMENDOUSLY BY THEIR NEW-FOUND
AND CRITICALLY IMPORTANT RESPONSIBILITIES.