Disaster Prevention Literacy Among School Administrators and Teachers: A Study on the Plan for Disaster Prevention and Campus Network Deployment and Experiment in Taiwan

Taiwan is located at the high-risk region of natural disasters with the frequently occurred earthquakes. The importance of the disaster prevention education on campus is made even more obvious by the fact that natural disasters often occur during the school days. Given the leading roles the school administrators and teachers playing in the disaster prevention education of their pupils, this study purposed to investigate how disaster prevention literacy was among them and how disaster prevention literacy differed across various background variables of them. Furthermore, the current study also examined if disaster prevention literacy changed by participation in the disaster prevention education program. The results suggested that, among three dimensions of disaster prevention literacy (i.e., knowledge, attitude, & skills) the participants were highest on disaster prevention skills and lowest on disaster prevention knowledge. Additionally, three dimensions of disaster prevention literacy of the participants differed by school level, age, years of service, personal disaster experience, and school disaster-stricken status. The participation in the disaster prevention education program was also related to participants’ disaster prevention literacy. The implications of the above findings were discussed and the recommendations were also made for future disaster prevention education programs and research. Key word: Disaster prevention education on campus, literacy, knowledge, attitude, skills.