Emergency Management Exemplary Service Award

Resilience is the capacity of a system, community or society to adapt to disturbances resulting from hazards by persevering, recuperating, or changing to reach and maintain an acceptable level of functioning. Resilience is a key element of the Emergency Management Framework for Canada and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030.

Resilient capacity is built through a process of empowering citizens, responders, organizations, communities, and governments, to share the responsibility to keep hazards from becoming disasters. Resilience minimizes vulnerability, dependence, and susceptibility by creating or strengthening social and physical capacity in the human and built environment to cope with, adapt to, respond to, and recover and learn from disasters.

Examples of achievements in this category can include excellence in:

• contributing to an inclusive and all-of-society disaster risk management approach, including prevention and mitigation activities
• strengthening disaster risk governance and collaboration, including initiatives to encourage the participation of relevant stakeholders
• contributing to an improved understanding of disaster risk
• enhancing preparedness and recovery to build back better following a disaster (including physical infrastructure as well as enhancements and innovations to policies, plans, procedures, and programs)
• increasing investment in disaster reduction and mitigation through structural and non-structural measures
• developing effective campaigns for public awareness and education
• enhancing disaster response capacity and coordination.

In addition to the above, specific examples of achievements may apply for Indigenous communities, such as:

• developing or delivering culturally appropriate emergency management training programs in Indigenous communities that align with the principles of ownership, control, access, and possession
• strengthening emergency management governance and partnerships through co-development with Indigenous communities
• excellence in response activities in Indigenous communities
• excellence in Indigenous community emergency management planning
• excellence in implementing mitigation strategies in Indigenous communities

This category recognizes contributions performed in a volunteer capacity, in a search and rescue organization that is a member of the Search and Rescue Volunteer Association of Canada, the Civil Air Search and Rescue Association, or the Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary, or whose status as a search and rescue organization is recognized by a provincial, municipal, or public authority.

Examples of achievements in this category can include excellence in:

• outstanding contribution to the development, delivery, or advancement of search and rescue
• operational and non-operational activities such as prevention, fundraising, and administrative support
• development or delivery of search and rescue education, exercise, and training activities
• contributing to the body of knowledge that informs search and rescue response and prevention activities
• research, development of new technology, or application of new innovations
• preventing or mitigating the severity and duration of search and rescue incidents
• developing effective campaigns for public awareness and education and/or delivering prevention messaging to reduce the frequency, severity, and duration of search and rescue incidents
• innovation in developing and implementing regulations and enforcement activities to change behavior
• search and rescue operations
• exemplary effort in the service to a community, in the provision of search and rescue

This category recognizes search and rescue contributions performed as an employee. This includes employees for whom search and rescue is a primary responsibility, as well as people who contribute to search and rescue through their paid work, even though they are not employed in a search and rescue role (for example, an academic contribution to the field of search and rescue).

Examples of achievements in this category can include excellence in:

• outstanding contribution to the development, delivery, or advancement of search and rescue
• operational and non-operational activities such as prevention or administrative support
• development or delivery of search and rescue education, exercise, and training activities
• contributing to the body of knowledge that informs search and rescue response and prevention activities
• research, development of new technology, or application of new innovations
• preventing or mitigating the severity and duration of search and rescue incidents
• developing effective campaigns for public awareness and education and/or delivering prevention messaging to reduce the frequency, severity, and duration of search and rescue incidents
• innovation in developing and implementing regulations and enforcement activities to change behavior
• search and rescue operations, including an exemplary effort in the service to a community in the provision of search and rescue

The Next Generation category is intended to recognize volunteers and employees in the early stages of their careers that are under the age of 30 at the date of application.

The Next Generation category is for youth candidates, not for programs directed at youth. Programs directed at youth can be nominated in the Resilient Communities category.

Examples of achievements in this category can include excellence in:

• an academic contribution to the emergency management field
• the course of one's duties in an emergency management profession
• the establishment of a community organization to advance emergency management

This category can include achievements that may not fall under the above categories.

Additionally, this category recognizes a sustained commitment to emergency management.

• For individuals, this can entail recognition of an outstanding career or for outstanding work
• For groups, this can entail recognition of an organization's remarkable contribution over a period of time, or a one-time event

Examples of achievements in this category can include excellence in:

• an emergency management career, at any level of government or other organization
• an organization's contribution to public awareness of emergency preparedness or other aspect of emergency management
• outstanding contribution to the development, delivery, or advancement of emergency management