Fire Science Technology AS Major

Students completing the Fire Science Technology Major will be eligible for career positions such as Firefighter, Fire Prevention specialists, Wildland Firefighter, Fire Investigator, Fire Engineer, Fire Hydraulics specialist, First Responder, Emergency Medical Technician, and Life Safety Directors in high rise buildings.

Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of this program, students will be able to:

• Articulate fire department organizational structure and operational levels
• Compare fire suppression systems and fire prevention programs that protect the public in various types of building construction
• Compare the effects of topography, aspect, and environmental factors on wildland fire behavior and wildland fire suppression, and types of fire prevention programs for the wildland setting
• Define the occupational safety and health concerns as it relates to emergency service organizations, such as fire and EMS
• Recognize medical emergencies and activate the EMS system

Students completing our AS Major will be prepared for hiring into agencies requiring a two-year degree to apply, to prepare for promotional opportunities that require a two-year degree as a minimum to test for promotion, and to have a balance of education and work-force related skills training.

Prerequisite skills are more particular to the Fire Academy program due to the requirements imposed by State Fire Training for Firefighter One certification.  Other courses require F SC 50 Intro to Fire Science as a baseline, or for the Work Experience program, certification as an EMT in order to be assigned to fire station work sites.

Fire Academy-40 to 48 per school year

Fire Science-25-30

Fire Science program awards are AS Major in Fire Science, Certificate of Achievement in Fire Science, Firefighter One (Fire Academy) Certificate of Achievement, Company Officer Certificate of Accomplishment (mirrors SFT Company Officer Certificate; this is being changed to a Certificate of Achievement and will be applied for in November, 2018); Cert of Achievement in Homeland Security.

All these prepare our students for entry application and promotional opportunities for the fire service. 

Program requirements narrative is shown below:

Course	Title	Units	Year/Semester (Y1 or S1)

Information in program requirements narrative above  is attached as part of the required BACCC application, and is presented here in case of any issues with attaching a the documentation:

AS Major in Fire Science Technology

Program Goals and Objectives

·        The goal of the Major in Fire Science Technologyis to prepare students for public or private sectoremployment in the fire service, in fields such as firefighter, company officer,chief officer positions, fire prevention, fire investigation, as well aspromotional opportunities that require more formal education.

 

Upon completion of this program, students will be able to:

• Articulate fire department organizational structure and operational levels
• Compare fire suppression systems and fire prevention programs that protect the public in various types of building construction
• Compare the effects of topography, aspect, and environmental factors on wildland fire behavior and wildland fire suppression, and types of fire prevention programs in the wildland setting
• Define the occupational health and safety concerns as it relates to emergency service organizations such as Fire and EMS
• Recognize medical emergencies and activate the EMS system

Catalog Description

Students completing the Fire Science Technology Majorwill be eligible for career positions such as Firefighter, Fire Preventionspecialists, Wildland Firefighter, Fire Investigator, Fire Engineer, FireHydraulics specialist, First Responder, Emergency Medical Technician, and LifeSafety Directors in high rise buildings.

Courses Required for the ASMajor in Fire Science

Course	Units	Sequence
Required courses:
F SC 50-Introduction to Fire Science	3.00	Year 1 Fall
F SC 52A-Fire Protection Equipment and Systems	3.00	Year 1 Fall
F SC 53-Building Construction and Fire	3.00	Year 1 Spring
F SC 57-Principles of Fire and Emergency Services: Safety and Survival	3.00	Year 1 Fall
F SC 61A-Introduction to Fire Prevention	3.00	Year 1 Spring
F SC 64-Fire Behavior and Combustion	3.00	Year 1 Spring
Total:	18.00
Choose one of the following required courses:
F SC 17 - Public Safety-Emergency Medical Responder	3.00	Year 1 Fall
EMT 100 - Emergency Medical Technician	8.00	Year 1 Spring
Total:	3.00 - 8.00
Choose three (3) units from the following:
F SC 51A-Fire Tactics and Strategy	3.00	Year 2 Fall
F SC 62-Rescue Practices	3.00	Year 1 Spring
F SC 107A-Fire Training Work Experience	1.00	Year 2 Spring
F SC 107B-Fire Training Work Experience	2.00	Year 2 Spring
F SC 111-Firefighter One Academy	11.50	Year 2 Fall
F SC 63-Vehicle Extrication	0.50	Year 2 Summer
LBCS 94D-Labor Relations in America	1.00	Year 2 Spring
F SC 145-Introduction to Homeland Security	3.00	Year 2 Spring
F SC 150-Fire Service Career Preparation	2.00	Year 1 Fall
Total:	3.00
Total:	24.00 - 29.00

 Year 1 Fall:  14 units

Year 1 Spring: 12 units

Year 2 Fall: 14.5 units

Year 2 Spring:10 units

Year 2 Summer: 0.50 unit

 

Master Planning:.  More and more, entry level into the fire service requires at a minimum a two-year degree in FireScience from a community college.  For many years, fire service training and formal education were pitted against each other. In the first half of the 20th century, firefighting was considered a physical trade with an established training regimen.

 

The G.I. Bill providedmoney for college or vocational education to returning World War II veterans, drawing thousands of returning veterans into higher education. College enrollments soared, and community colleges sprang up and grew nationwide. Manyreturning veterans who entered the fire service also wanted to claim theeducational benefits made available through the G.I. Bill, but the systemlacked structured fire service education programs. The funding windfall,coupled with interest in the fire service, fueled development of early firescience programs—principally in emerging community and technical collegedomains, helping higher education creep into the back door of the firehouse.

 

Concurrently, the patronage system for entry and advancement in local government service came under assault. Beginning with the Pendleton Act in 1883 and followed by the Hatch Act in 1939, merit-based civil service systems gradually followed thefederal example and moved into state and local governments.

 

Some firefighters who combined training with higher education routinely achieved higher test results.Those left behind blamed higher education for circumventing the established system and damaging their careers. In turn, they set the stage for a contestbetween education and training.

 

But as higher education gained hold in the fire service, the training-only philosophy was supplanted by a new approach. Enterprising instructors established firetraining curricula into college curricula so a firefighter could get bothtraining credit and college credit for the same effort. But without planning orcoordination, the result was an uncoordinated and often failed. A good exampleof the progress made is with the California Fire Technology Director’s Association (CFTDA) in California.  Thisis the lobbying group for California community colleges, and they work closelywith the California State Fire Marshal’s Office of State Fire Training in two areas-entry level education, new-hire education, and promotional education.  Along with a partnership with IFSAC and ProBoard, students completing State of California Firefighter One training, can utilize their certification and training in many other States when applying for Firefighter entry level positions. Today, we recognize that both training and education comprise essential parts of fire servicecompetency.

 

Part of this capability is an educational process that prepares prospective employees with the pertinent education in specific areas of fire service publicsafety specifically.

 

City College will continue to be a comprehensivecommunity college that will provide opportunities for student transfer, careerand technical education, basic skills, and English as a Second Language instruction as well as opportunities for lifelong learning and personalenrichment. City College will continuously align its Career Technical Education (CTE) programs with marketrealities in order to meet students’ educational needs.

 

Although CCSF can and does develop new coursesor programs in response to demonstrated industry need, the DWM frameworkrequires Colleges to interact, pursue and manage grants, and plan workforce and CTE offerings in a new way.  Colleges are expected to follow a sector strategy model, work regionally to align programs with industry needs, leverage existing programs throughout the region, pursue funding through collaborative efforts, and report data on student outcomes on the Launchboard, a statewide system.  New programs, Associate degrees, and Certificates of Achievement must be endorsed by voting members of BACCC which includes CTE and Workforce Deans from the 28regional colleges.

 

The CCSF Master Educational plan report compares degree and certificate offerings in the Bay Area, explores the breadth of existing programs in the Bay Area, and identifies those programs that are unique to City College and those programs that overlap with other, similar institutions.  This analysis uses 23 institutions labeled as “two-year or less” operating in a 25-mile radius ofCity College of San Francisco.  Future approaches will more fully incorporate the Bay Area Community College Consortium (BACCC), our “competitors” and colleagues in collaborative efforts from 28 regional colleges.  These include Berkeley, Cabrillo, Canada, Chabot, College of Alameda, College of San Mateo,Contra Costa, De Anza, Diablo Valley, Evergreen, Foothill, Gavilan, Hartnell, Laney, Las Positas, Los Medanos, College of Marin, Merritt, Mission, MonterreyPeninsula, Napa Valley, Ohlone, CCSF, San Jose, Santa Rosa, Skyline, Solano, West Valley.  

 

There are 117,402 credit students enrolled in public and private postsecondary institutions offering two-year degrees or lessin a 25-mile radius of City College. Credit enrollment at the City College numbered 30,106, representing 26% of student population for two-year degree or less institutions within the 25-mile radius.  Two-year public colleges account for 95% of the total enrollment among all 2-year degree and less institutions in this radius.  The second largest set of “competitors” was private 2-year for-profit institutions at a combined percentage of 4%.

 

For a school of its size, it is not surprisingthat City College offers a large number of courses, as well as a large numberof degree and certificate programs compared to other, neighboring institutions.  There are 53 programsoffered at CCSF that are not offered elsewhere by two-year institutions in the Bay Area.

 

City College of San Francisco has a robust FireScience/Fire Academy program.  Hiring into the fire service slowed literally to a crawl after the 2008 economic collapse that endangered the entire country. Many fire agencies across the state and country either stopped hiring or slowed it significantly.  However, as theeconomy as recovered in the last 8 years, hiring has resumed in greater and greater numbers.  Many City College Fire Science students have been hired into the San Francisco Fire Department, other bay area departments, and state agencies such as CalFire.  Similarly, peninsula and east bay community colleges have seen their students hired in ever increasing numbers into their local fire agencies.  This has really resulted in a more collaborative approach to fire service education in the bayarea.  One solid example is the recent re-accreditation of the College of San Mateo as they  went through that process for their Fire Academy.  CCSF was contacted for advice and support in their process, and we eagerly supported them.  This was a positive payback for when they supported us in 2007 when we were first accredited as a Regional Fire Training Program (ARTP). 

 

The CCSF Strong Workforce Program (SWP) 2017-2020 Strategic Plan (referred to as“Plan” heretofore), embodies this core commitment. The Plan provides a guide for how CCSF can support student achievement and career readiness through the strategic application of funds from the state Strong Workforce Program (SWP), a new source of workforce development funding available to public two-yearcolleges statewide through the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office (CCCCO).

 

Enrollment development is designed to strengthen CTE outreach and enrollment. Program Enhancement is designed to focus on: strengthen existing CTE programs and occupational clusters at CCSF; address gaps in funding; encourage the development of innovative curriculum; support student success strategies, such as learning communities; decrease system barriers to completion, such as sequencing and program advising; increase job placement support; deepen industry engagement; fund updated equipment supplies and facilities.

 

Place of Program in Curriculum/Similar Programs

This AS Major complements other areas in our Department: Administration of Justice, Forensics, Homeland Security, Fire Science, Fire Academy and Company Officer(Company Officer mirrors State Fire Training Company Officer certification) and improves career opportunities for our students. STEM programs at City College also prepare our students for the technical aspects such as computer intelligence and data analysis and development systems.

 

The Fire Academy program will be changing campus in the summer of 2019. We have been at the CCSF Airport Campus since we started that program in 2008.  Due to SFIA taking over that land, the Fire Academy is moving to the John Adams campus, which is where the EMT and Paramedic programs are located.  This will result in improved educational programs, program specific training, and sharing of resources.  Both departments are eagerly looking forward to this relocation.

 

Similar Programs at Other Colleges in Service Area

Local community colleges that have fire science and fire academy programs are College of San Mateo and Chabot in our immediate region, and Santa Rosa Junior College in the North Bay.  Due to the number of students attempting to get hired into the fire service, there is no impact on one school hurting for students at the expense of another. We are all full in enrollment and preparing our students for hiring into the fire service.  We also work closely and collaboratively to support each other. We are all members of the Regional Joint Venture for Public SafetyPrograms, as well the California Fire Technology Director’s Association. 

 

Labor Market Information (LMI)and Analysis

Seedocument attachment prepared by the San Francisco Bay Center of Excellence

Advisory CommitteeRecommendation

 Our Advisory Board has supported and provided direction in making sure our degree and certificate programs are current, contemporary, and meet student needs

NOTE:  Our nextAdvisory Board meeting is scheduled for November or early December of this current school semester.

 

Regional ConsortiumRecommendation

Request submitted 10/8/18 so no BACCC agenda available as of this date.

 

Thankyou,

JimConnors

Dept.Chair, Adm. of Justice/Fire Science

CityCollege of San Francisco

jconnors@ccsf.edu/415-239-3202

Nothing more to add.

Most closely would be College of San Mateo, Chabot, and Santa Rosa in the North Bay area, and there is no impact by us on those institutions, or vice-versa.