The BE AWARE project

The BE AWARE project: Building Effective Social Resilience for Any Weather Accident Requiring Evacuation is an initiative financed by the Visegrad Grants Program as part of the Visegrad Fund. The aim of the program is to build social resilience among local communities from the Myslenice district (Poland), the city of Zlin (Czech Republic), and the Čadca district (Slovakia). The project partners are: Instytut Nauk o Bezpieczeństwie Staropolskiej Akademii Nauk Stosowanych w Kielcach (Poland), Fakulta bezpečnostného inžinierstva Žilinská Univerzita v Žiline (Slovakia), Fakulta aplikované informatiky Univerzita Tomáše Bati ve Zlíně oraz Fakulta logistiky a krizového řízení Univerzita Tomáše Bati ve Zlíně (Czechia).

The project idea arose from observations of security issues currently being discussed in the European Union and NATO. The project partners noticed that since 2016, the European Union has seen a discussion on the need to build social resilience. Furthermore, one of the conclusions of the NATO summit in Warsaw on July 8-9, 2016 was to enforce a joint commitment to build social resilience, including self-organization of society through education, understanding of the threat and providing knowledge on how to respond during Its occurrence. In Poland, this is an absolutely crucial and actual issue. Since January 2025, the proper law was passed and works accelerated on its implementation. This observation points to the political need to shape social resilience. In addition, in Visegrad countries could be observed significant deficiencies in resilience among local community members. Research conducted by Partners showed lack of recognition of emergency signals, which is an elementary requirement for responding to an crisis situation. Lack of evacuation readiness. Deficiencies in the preparedness of volunteer fire departments. The same results can be found in the report of the Supreme Chamber of Control’s: only 30% of Poland’s existing Voluntary Fire Brigades units are prepared for rescue operations. Taking into account both the political need and the social need, but also the current experience (fires, hurricanes, floods, war, pandemic etc.), it is necessary to consider public awareness of threats, the ability to prevent them and respond during their occurrence, as a key 21st century skil.

In response to the observed problem, the Partners decided that, raising awareness of how to recognize and behave during crisis is a key element in building social resilience. In the context crisis management evacuation often represents one of the most effective forms of protection. The ability of residents to respond appropriately and evacuate efficiently can significantly reduce casualties and property damage. Especially since some areas (e.g., a nursing home) require special evacuation skills. Volunteer firefighters are recruited directly from members of the local community. Thus, their training is important for shaping the social resilience of the selected areas. Firefighters are a type of public service, which implies a higher awareness of responsibility for local security. It is therefore assumed that they will be able to spread the information acquired during the project. Computer-based decision-making games are recognized in the literature as an effective and interesting teaching tool.

Therefore, the goal of the project is to shape the social resilience for any weather accident requiring evacuation by preparing and using computer decision-making simulations among Volunteer firefighters. The project is intended to build awareness of possible universal behavior during various types of threats. Aso intended to show how to deal with danger in various types of non-common buildings. For the purposes of the project will be prepared: training aplication, teaching programs and computer decision-making simulations, exercises for Volunteer firefighters from Myslenice poviat, city of Zlin, Čadca district, research on effectiveness of decision-making games.

The project also involves research on the effectiveness of computer decision-making game simulations as practical training. As a result of the research, it is expected to indicate how to improve the effectiveness of this type of training. The results of the research are expected to contribute to the popularization of this form of training as well. In addition, the preparation of decision-making games of the scope of universal procedures (evacuation during weather events) is to allow the application of the acquired skills to other hazards as well. The training of firefighters – socially engaged people – is expected to increase the social resilience of the entire local community.

Project partners:

Žilinská Univerzita v Žiline, Fakulta bezpečnostného inžinierstva; Website: https://fbi.uniza.sk

Univerzita Tomáše Bati ve Zlíně , Fakulta aplikované informatiky; Website: https://fai.utb.cz/en
Univerzita Tomáše Bati ve Zlíně, Fakulta logistiky a krizového řízení; Website: https://flkr.utb.cz/en/

Instytut Nauk o Bezpieczeństwie Staropolska Akademia Nauk Stosowanych w Kielcach;
Website: https://stsw.edu.pl/struktura/instytut-nauk-o-bezpieczenstwie-i-zdrowiu/