NIMS Activity 2: Designate and maintain a Single Point of Contact

Once an educational entity has formally adopted NIMS, K-12 schools and higher education institution (IHE) designate a NIMS Single Point of Contact (NIMS POC) to serve as the principal coordinator for the organization's administrative and operational offices, departments, committees, and teams.

ADOPTION

Activity 2: Designate and maintain a Single Point of Contact to serve as principal coordinator for NIMS implementation at the school- and campus-community level.

Once an educational entity has formally adopted NIMS, K-12 schools and higher education institution (IHE) designate a NIMS Single Point of Contact (NIMS POC) to serve as the principal coordinator for the organization's administrative and operational offices, departments, committees, and teams.

Association to NIMS

Adoption of NIMS puts forth the core set of concepts, principles, procedures, organizational processes, and terminology to build the national unified approach to incident response across the full spectrum of potential incidents and hazards scenarios. Additionally, NIMS adoption supports the national framework to collectively manage incidents by public agencies and private entities of all jurisdictional levels and disciplines using the same system.

One key attribute of NIMS is its use of the NIMS POC within each entity. The NIMS POC is a facilitation and coordination role helping to ensure the consistent adoption and implementation of NIMS by community response organizations, both internally and externally with partners. The NIMS POC position includes roles and responsibilities to facilitate NIMS adoption and integration. The NIMS POC is also responsible for overseeing, coordinating, and communicating NIMS implementation.

The NIMS POC is primarily responsible for communicating and coordinating NIMS activities internally in order to help facilitate and reinforce consistent NIMS adoption. The NIMS POC helps ensure NIMS implementation activities are put forth throughout the four phases (Prevention-Mitigation, Preparedness, Response, and Recovery) of school and IHE emergency management.

The NIMS POC also works with external partners (including the local emergency management authority and additional community response partners) as a means for ensuring seamless integration with partners; the NIMS POC serves as the single point of contact during emergency management activities to promote effective coordination and communication of NIMS implementation.

Implementation Guidance

Schools and IHEs that adopt and implement NIMS at the organizational and operational levels as well as within all appropriate offices, departments, committees, and teams should designate a NIMS POC. The NIMS POC role is designed to help ensure effective and consistent integration of NIMS both within the educational entity as well as when a district, school, or IHE partners with local community agencies such as local emergency management, law enforcement, and fire agencies. Schools' and IHEs' designation of a NIMS POC will support the implementation of NIMS, its systematic approach, and the pre-determined set of scalable response actions with community partners. The NIMS POC's name could be exchanged with partner NIMS POCs affiliated via Memoranda of Agreement or partner agreements within each community to further coordinate implementation of NIMS at the local or regional levels.

Based on the responsibilities, the role of the NIMS POC should be assigned to a leadership position that has authority to supervise NIMS adoption and implementation as a means for ensuring it is consistently applied by the district, school, or IHE administrative and operational offices, departments, committees, and teams.

The designation should be attached to a leadership position that has the capacity to 1.) Ensure NIMS is well integrated into the entity's existing processes, procedures, and reporting activities, 2.) Conduct outreach activities on behalf of the school or IHE with community partners, and 3.) Report NIMS activities as a component of performance reviews. Depending upon the unique school, district, or IHE community, the role and responsibilities of the NIMS POC may vary as well as the position of the individual to which this role is assigned.

Furthermore, when applicable, some K-12 schools or IHEs may want to designate additional internal NIMS POCs at secondary and tertiary levels. For example, at the district level, the NIMS POC may elect to establish building-level NIMS POC positions, responsible for facilitating the communication, coordination, and oversight responsibilities from the district to the building level. Another example would be a large IHE; an IHE may consider designating secondary NIMS POCs at the departmental levels to facilitate implementation. (NOTE: These might be the same individuals that are serving as the campus or school emergency management team leads.)

As FY 2009 REMS and Emergency Management for Higher Education (EMHE) grantees, the Project Directors must ensure a NIMS POC is designated and formalized. The school or IHE emergency management team should ensure the NIMS POC contact information is shared internally and with external partners. When documenting NIMS implementation activities, Project Directors should document the date of designation as well as the date of internal and external announcement.