West Clermont Local School District
Bylaws & Policies
 

8300 - CONTINUITY OF ORGANIZATIONAL OPERATIONS PLAN

The Continuity of Organizational Operations Plan (COOP) provides the District with the capability of conducting its essential operations under all threats and conditions with or without warning. Having a plan to recover from any type of disaster regardless of the severity and consequences of the emergency is critical to recovery of operations and can minimize the impact on the District’s teaching and learning, personnel, facilities, technology, transportation, food service, and other functional resources.

Scope of the Continuity Plan

The primary objective of the COOP is to restore the District’s critical operational functions and the learning environment as quickly as possible after a crisis or threat event has occurred. A COOP contains critical and sensitive information that is confidential and exempt from public disclosure.

Planning for the continuity of operations of a school system in the aftermath of a disaster is a complex task. The current changing threat environment and recent emergencies, including acts of nature, accidents, technological emergencies, and terrorist attacks and threats, have increased the need for viable continuity capabilities and plans that enable the District to resume and continue the essential functions in an all-hazards environment across a full spectrum of emergencies. Such conditions have increased the importance of having continuity plans in place that provide stability of essential functions across the various levels of public government and private enterprises.

The planning and development of continuity of an organizational operations plan, as well as the ongoing review and revision of such a plan, is important for the overall District and department in the District.

The District-wide plan describes how the District will respond as a total organization to a given emergency and describes the centralized resources and how they will be organized to implement command and control necessary to function during the life cycle of the event. Individual school and departmental plans contain the details related to the continuity plan for those specific sites and functional areas to prepare for an event, communicate throughout the duration of an event, assess the impact of an event on essential functions in the unit, respond to the event, and detail what will be done to recover from the event.

Preparation for, response to, and recovery from a disaster affecting administrative, educational, and support functions of the District’s operations requires the cooperative efforts of external organizations, in partnership with the functional areas supporting the business of the District. This includes local government agencies, law enforcement, emergency management, medical services, and vendors necessary to District operations. The COOP outlines and coordinates all efforts by the District in cooperation with other local and State agencies and businesses to restore the essential functions of the District to the larger local community post-disaster.

The Superintendent shall recommend the COOP for Board of Education review and approval; however, the COOP shall be considered a confidential document not subject to release under State public records laws and accordingly no copies shall be provided for public review during the adoption process.

The Superintendent shall conduct periodic review of the COOP.

Adopted 5/23/17

© Neola 2017