Perceived Competence and Preparedness of recent Fire Academy Graduates

[ABSTRACT ONLY; NO FULL TEXT] Firefighters must first complete trainings from an accredited fire academy before entering the profession. The primary goal of the fire academy is to train individuals to become competent firefighters capable of performing physically demanding job-related tasks. While extensive research has been done on professional firefighters who have previously graduated from an academy, there is virtually no information on the perceived competency and preparedness of recent fire academy graduates. While future firefighters are taught in fire academies using a well-established curriculum, there is a scarcity of scientific research on the overall capability of graduates immediately leaving the academy for the workforce. More precisely, there was a lack of research on whether graduates of fire academies have an internal belief that they are competent in firefighting operations. As a result, the purpose of this study was to assess the perceived competence and preparedness of recent fire academy graduates prior to entering the firefighting profession in five core areas of firefighting: personal protective equipment, search and rescue, hose operations, structural firefighting, and wildland firefighting. To assess the perceived competence and preparedness of fire academy graduates, a recruitment email with a link to a web-based survey was sent to the fire academy administrators and asked to forward the email with the link to the graduating cadets. In total, 7 individuals participated in the pilot study. The findings of this pilot study suggested that the content area with the lowest perceived competence was search and rescue, which received an average of 4.37. Despite the fact that search and rescue is the lowest content area, a 4.37 average suggests that the majority of respondents believe they are competent in this content area. The content area with the highest perceived competency was structural firefighting with a score of 4.66, indicating that most individuals strongly believed they were competent in this content area. While fire academies teach fundamental information for entry-level firefighter applicants in order to meet job performance standards, it is difficult to assert that all candidates strongly agree that they are competent. Overall, the typical individual felt they were highly competent or otherwise found themselves strongly agreeing with perceived competence after completing the fire academy.