Safety City opens again for third graders

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WSAZ) – The Charleston Police Department, with the help of the Charleston Fire Department, is taking a different, more hands-on approach to teaching students safety.

Charleston Police Department Cpl. Josh Harper said: ‘We teach children about fire safety, walking close to the road, the rules of the road and danger to strangers. We learn about a lot of different things that they need to learn while they’re here.

The fire and police departments created Safety City as a place where students could learn how to stay safe.

At Safety City, students not only hear from the Charleston Police Department and Charleston Fire Department about how to stay safe, they can also take what they’ve learned and take it to the streets of Safety City – and even climb out of a smokehouse .

“We use this city as a backdrop, so that they get a realistic idea of everything they have learned here and can apply it. So when they’re driving, they know to stop at stop signs, to use the traffic lights and also to look for pedestrians,” Harper said.

Post-COVID, the Charleston Police Department and Charleston Fire Department have reworked the curriculum they will teach at Safety City.

“We went over our stuff again and we updated a lot of things, you know. We’ve added cybersecurity and things like that. The world is changing, so we had to update some things,” Harper said.