College hosts fourth Rotorfest

Pennsylvania College of Technology welcomed nearly 400 K-12 students to 14 schools for its fourth Rotorfest.

The event, organized by students from the college’s emergency management & homeland security program, provides an opportunity for attendees to interact with a wide range of emergency response professionals.

“Rotorfest is a hands-on activity providing a fantastic real-world learning laboratory for our students,” said William A. Schlosser, instructor of emergency management & homeland security. “The growth that I see in students when they are a freshman working in the staging areas to when they are upperclassmen working in the command staff roles and planning the event is truly awe inspiring.”

Katie E. Martin, of Ocean View, Delaware, served as the student incident commander alongside Schlosser. Staging area managers were Nathan R. Campisi, of Mechanicsburg, Steven M. Laity, of Nanticoke, and Dylan T. Luckey, of Binghamton, New York.

Martin said she and her team organized details of the event for three months, holding weekly planning and coordination meetings.

“This team has given countless hours to Rotorfest on top of all their schoolwork and personal lives, and the program is immensely grateful for them,” she said.

The most exciting part of Rotorfest, she added, is seeing those months of hard work put into action.

“Organizing functional exercises and working with these exact stakeholders are exactly what we are going to be doing in the real world,” Martin said. “When we are running incidents in disaster zones in the future, we will already have an established connection with these other teams. Our professors giving us the opportunity to network within our industry is invaluable and something I know all students in the program are eternally grateful for.”

On hand for this year’s Rotorfest were the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, Williamsport Bureau of Fire, Williamsport Bureau of Police, Lycoming County Public Safety, Laurel Mountain K9 Seach & Rescue, Federal Bureau of Investigations, Penn College Police, UPMC North Central Pa., Geisinger Life Flight No. 4, Pennsylvania Army National Guard, Civil Air Patrol, Lycoming County Coroner’s Office, PPL Corp., Old Lycoming Volunteer Fire Department (Task Force 81), Rescue One Training for Life Inc., Federal Bureau of Prisons, North Central Task Force – Incident Management Unit, and Penn College’s admissions office, members of the heavy equipment program, Army Reserve Officer Training Corps and Emergency Management Club.

Participating schools were Benton Area High School, Central Pennsylvania Institute of Science & Technology, Columbia-Montour Area Vocational Technical School, Erie County Technical School, Danville Middle School, Kutztown Area High School, Liberty Valley Intermediate, Lycoming Day Treatment, North Penn-Liberty High School, North Penn-Mansfield High School, Shenandoah Valley High School, Sullivan County High School, Wilkes-Barre Area High School, Wellsboro High School.