What Can I Do with a Fire Science Degree?

Key Infor­ma­tion:

• A fire sci­ence degree opens up var­i­ous career paths, includ­ing fire­fight­ing, fire pre­ven­tion, fire pro­tec­tion, and fire inves­ti­ga­tion. It pre­pares pro­fes­sion­als to under­stand fire behav­ior, use fire­fight­ing tech­nol­o­gy, and man­age fire safety.
• Accred­i­ta­tion by rec­og­nized orga­ni­za­tions like FESHE is cru­cial for ensur­ing the qual­i­ty of fire sci­ence programs.
• Fire sci­ence degrees offer spe­cial­iza­tions in fire­fight­ing, fire prevention/protection, and fire inves­ti­ga­tion.
• Many pro­grams are avail­able online, offer­ing flex­i­bil­i­ty for stu­dents who need to bal­ance their stud­ies with oth­er commitments.

Grow­ing up did you won­der — What does a fire chief do? And, do you now ask your­self — What can I do with a fire sci­ence degree?

The ulti­mate objec­tive of fire sci­ence (and its sis­ter field, fire research) is to improve avail­able fire sup­pres­sion and fire pre­ven­tion tech­niques that are used in train­ing fire­fight­ers and sup­port­ing pro­fes­sion­al fire­fight­ers on the job. The results obtained from fire sci­ence research are used to mod­i­fy pro­fes­sion­al fire and emer­gency ser­vices train­ing pro­grams, as well as the tools and tech­niques for fire­fight­ers on the front lines. In the age of wild­fires and domes­tic ter­ror­ism, fire sci­ence is crucial.

Fire science’s pri­ma­ry mis­sion is to pro­tect peo­ple and prop­er­ty from the poten­tial dam­age and destruc­tion caused by a fire event. The field of fire sci­ence is quite com­pre­hen­sive and includes the dis­ci­plines of Fire Safe­ty, Fire­fight­ing, Fire Sci­ence Tech­nol­o­gy, Fire Pre­ven­tion, and Fire Pro­tec­tion, among others.

Relat­ed:

• Best Online Fire Sci­ence Degree Bach­e­lor’s Programs
• Best Bach­e­lor’s in Fire Sci­ence Degree Programs
• Fastest Online Fire Sci­ence Degree Bach­e­lor’s Programs
• Most Afford­able Fire Sci­ence Degree Bach­e­lor Programs

A more tech­ni­cal fire sci­ence def­i­n­i­tion would read as follows:

Fire sci­ence is a spe­cial­ty dis­ci­pline that inte­grates both sci­ence and engi­neer­ing doc­trines as a means to bet­ter under­stand the caus­es, the effects, and the byprod­ucts of fire. Fire sci­ence exam­ines the con­cept of fire from many per­spec­tives — from fire pre­ven­tion to fire investigations.

Earn­ing a fire sci­ence degree opens up many career oppor­tu­ni­ties. A par­tial list of pos­si­ble fire ser­vice-relat­ed indus­tries includes

• Fire Behav­ior
• Fire Depart­ment Administration
• Fire Inves­ti­ga­tions & Analysis
• Fire Pre­ven­tion
• Fire Pro­tec­tion
• Fire Safe­ty
• Fire Sci­ence Technology
• Fire and Emer­gency Ser­vices Administration
• Haz­ardous Mate­r­i­al Handling

School/Program Accreditation for Fire Science

It can be a bit daunt­ing to research schools and degree pro­grams when prepar­ing to fur­ther your edu­ca­tion in fire sci­ence and fire ser­vices admin­is­tra­tion. This is because there are an over­whelm­ing amount of schools and degree pro­grams from which to choose. And if that was not com­pli­cat­ed enough, there are many oth­er fac­tors to con­sid­er for each school and each degree program.

For­tu­nate­ly, there are ways to help sort through the moun­tains of infor­ma­tion avail­able to stu­dents vying for a post-sec­ondary degree. Begin by deter­min­ing if the schools of inter­est have received accred­i­ta­tion — a des­ig­na­tion that denotes the school (or pro­gram) has met or exceed­ed indus­try edu­ca­tion­al standards.

School accred­i­ta­tion is rec­og­nized as one of the most rel­e­vant fac­tors when eval­u­at­ing the qual­i­ty of the school/program as it is per­formed by a neu­tral over­sight orga­ni­za­tion. With ref­er­ence to the field of fire sci­ence, most stu­dents seek out FES­HE-rec­og­nized schools or pro­grams. A school’s accred­i­ta­tion is often a crit­i­cal fac­tor because many poten­tial employ­ers only hire grad­u­ates of a FES­HE-rec­og­nized school or program.

Accred­i­ta­tion Types

There are sev­er­al lev­els of accred­i­ta­tion that eval­u­ates post-sec­ondary insti­tu­tions of high­er edu­ca­tions and the degree pro­grams they offer. The broad­est accred­i­ta­tion occurs at a nation­al level.

Nation­al Accreditation

The US Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion (DOE) is tasked with the respon­si­bil­i­ty of accred­it­ing those schools with the min­i­mum edu­ca­tion stan­dards for the nation as a whole. The DOE assess­es each school against pre-deter­mined edu­ca­tion bench­marks defined the nation’s edu­ca­tion lead­ers. Any rep­utable insti­tu­tion of high­er learn­ing should be nation­al­ly accred­it­ed. Employ­ers require, at a bare min­i­mum, a school to have received nation­al accreditation.

Region­al Accreditation

Region­al accred­i­ta­tion is a more focused over­sight pro­gram. Region­al accred­i­ta­tion is gen­er­al­ly pre­ferred by most employ­ers but is not always nec­es­sary. Addi­tion­al­ly, the process of region­al accred­i­ta­tion is strict­ly vol­un­tary, and can only be ini­ti­at­ed by a school or uni­ver­si­ty. Each region­al accred­it­ing agency cov­ers a defined area. As such, there are many region­al accred­it­ing across the Unit­ed States.

In addi­tion, there are numer­ous sanc­tioned accred­it­ing orga­ni­za­tions that accred­it indus­try-spe­cif­ic schools and pro­gram. This type of accred­i­ta­tion is dis­cussed below.

Indus­try and Pro­gram-Spe­cif­ic Accreditation

Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, each indus­try uses an approved over­sight agency (or two, or three for larg­er indus­tries) to ensure the indus­try-relat­ed pro­grams and schools meet basic indus­try guide­lines and train­ing cre­den­tials. In the fire sci­ence indus­try, the pri­ma­ry over­sight orga­ni­za­tion eval­u­at­ing pro­gram stan­dards and school is the Fire & Emer­gency Ser­vices High­er Edu­ca­tion net­work. This net­work is detailed below.

The Fire & Emer­gency Ser­vices High­er Edu­ca­tion (FESHE) Network

FESHE’s mis­sion is to reduce the loss of prop­er­ty and the loss of peo­ple from a fire occur­rence. The Fire & Emer­gency Ser­vices High­er Edu­ca­tion (FESHE) Net­work is the brain­child of the Unit­ed States Fire Admin­is­tra­tion. FESHE’s fun­da­men­tal objec­tive was to estab­lish a set of stan­dards for fire offi­cers and fire­fight­ers regard­ing the imple­men­ta­tion of high­er edu­ca­tion stan­dards. These ele­vat­ed stan­dards are designed to reduce the dam­age and destruc­tion of fire events.

Some of FESHE mem­bers’ have made remark­able con­tri­bu­tions in many ways:

• Coor­di­nat­ing projects with the Nation­al Fall­en Fire­fight­ers Foundations
• Cre­at­ing a pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment matrix mod­el upon which degree and train­ing pro­grams can refer
• Defin­ing out­lines to be used by fire sci­ence course developers
• Devel­op­ing a nation­al fire sci­ence pro­fes­sion­al model
• Part­ner­ing with pub­lish­ers to ensure text­books com­ply with the FESHE mod­el plans
• Set­ting the indus­try guide­lines that define the min­i­mum stan­dards of col­le­giate edu­ca­tion­al degree programs

Types of Fire Science Degrees

A fire sci­ence degree is avail­able in a wide vari­ety of spe­cial­ties and con­cen­tra­tions. Many online fire sci­ence degrees focus on a first-respon­der cur­ricu­lum, while oth­ers fol­low a more Bach­e­lor in Emer­gency Man­age­ment-relat­ed cur­ricu­lum. Any way you slice it, a Fire Sci­ence Bach­e­lor Degree is a great edu­ca­tion­al step­ping-stone toward a reward­ing career in the fire sci­ence indus­try. Stu­dents may study full-time or part-time, in either on-cam­pus or online learn­ing environments.

Fire Sci­ence Bach­e­lor degrees are loose­ly cat­e­go­rized into three group­ings. The degrees of fire sci­ence include Fire­fight­ing, Fire Prevention/Protection, and Fire Investigation.

Fire­fight­ing

The best degrees for fire­fight­ers pre­pare pro­fes­sion­als by teach­ing stu­dents to under­stand the con­cept of fire the­o­ry, to prop­er­ly use fire­fight­ing tech­nol­o­gy and equip­ment, and demon­strate an under­stand­ing of the prin­ci­ples of pumps, tech­ni­cal appa­ra­tus & vic­tim recov­ery. Some of the best degrees for fire­fight­ers are avail­able com­plete­ly online and often as a hybrid deliv­ered pro­gram, though tra­di­tion­al on-cam­pus pro­grams have their advan­tages – espe­cial­ly in mak­ing job-mar­ket connections.

Many pro­fes­sion­als choose to earn a Fire Admin­is­tra­tion Degree to obtain posi­tions of lead­er­ship and pol­i­cy-mak­ing. Many top fire sci­ence col­leges offer a cer­tifi­cate of fire safe­ty or a fire safe­ty offi­cer course as a means to advance one’s career. Stu­dents earn­ing an online fire admin­is­tra­tion degree are qual­i­fied for fire safe­ty man­age­r­i­al posi­tions. Even top fire sci­ence col­leges offer fire sci­ence degrees online for stu­dents who require a more con­ve­nient and flex­i­ble option.

Fire Inves­ti­ga­tion

A fire sci­ence degree that empha­sizes a fire inves­ti­ga­tion cur­ricu­lum explores the many cut­ting-edge tech­niques that help deter­mine the caus­es and eval­u­ate dam­ages from a fire event, in addi­tion to the appro­pri­ate han­dling of mate­r­i­al evi­dence. This includes arson inves­ti­ga­tions, fire codes, and fire hazards.

Stu­dents inter­est­ed in spe­cial­iz­ing in fire inves­ti­ga­tions will find that fire sci­ence bach­e­lor degree col­leges now offer online fire sci­ence degrees with a fire inves­ti­ga­tion spe­cial­ty. The fire sci­ence degree require­ments for entrance into a fire sci­ence degree pro­gram gen­er­al­ly include a high school diplo­ma or an equiv­a­len­cy credential.

Fire Pro­tec­tion and Prevention

An emer­gency man­age­ment degree that empha­sizes fire pro­tec­tion and pre­ven­tion inte­grates the con­struc­tion indus­try with the tech-ori­ent­ed/engi­neer­ing-relat­ed field of fire pro­tec­tion and pre­ven­tion. A fire sci­ence bachelor’s degree in fire pro­tec­tion is often offered by some of the best col­leges for fire pro­tec­tion engineering.

A fire sci­ence bach­e­lor degree in fire pre­ven­tion and pro­tec­tion very often includes a cer­tifi­cate in fire safe­ty and a fire safe­ty offi­cer course option, in addi­tion to its stan­dard­ized cur­ricu­lum. Addi­tion­al­ly, many top fire sci­ence col­leges offer accred­it­ed online fire pro­tec­tion cours­es as a part of some of the best online fire sci­ence degree programs.

Fire sci­ence is also the study of fire pro­tec­tion and pre­ven­tion. Fire sci­ence involves the con­struc­tion industry’s prin­ci­ple beliefs in rela­tion to fire safe­ty stan­dards. These con­struc­tion con­cepts are very much a part of a fire sci­ence degree pro­gram. Fire sci­ence also explores the prin­ci­ples of haz­ardous mate­ri­als’ management.

The bot­tom-line: A Bach­e­lor in Emer­gency Man­age­ment degree offers many career options with­in the field of fire sci­ence and emer­gency services.

Note — With the recent pop­u­lar­i­ty of MOOCs — Mas­sive Open Online cours­es — many degree pro­gram course­work is now avail­able to any­one who owns a com­put­er and has Inter­net access. And while there are free online fire cours­es with cer­tifi­cate pro­grams offered, there is a cost to obtain a copy of the writ­ten cer­tifi­cate. Be cer­tain to read the fine details for any free online fire cours­es with cer­tifi­cate offering.

Certifications/Licenses for Fire Science & Emergency Administration

Fire­fight­ing is a risky busi­ness. As such, fire­fight­ers and fire sci­ence pro­fes­sion­als must meet pro­fes­sion­al stan­dards and the phys­i­cal demands of the job. Both pro­fes­sion­al and vol­un­teer fire­fight­ers must demon­strate the phys­i­cal fit­ness required of this position.

Of note, vol­un­teer fire­fight­ers account for about 2/3 of all fire­fight­ers in the country.

Licen­sure

While there are no spe­cif­ic indus­try licens­es issued to become a fire pro­fes­sion­al, an appli­cant is required to write to the fire depart­ment of their choice to sched­ule a test of one’s phys­i­cal abil­i­ties. The phys­i­cal part of the exam is designed to deter­mine if the inter­est­ed par­ty is capa­ble of man­ag­ing what can be enor­mous amounts of phys­i­cal efforts fire­fight­ers endure.

Train­ing and Certification

While each state’s reg­u­la­tions vary, many states require the more ele­vat­ed posi­tions of a Fire Inves­ti­ga­tor, Fire Offi­cer, Fire Chief, and Fire Inspec­tors to hold appro­pri­ate cer­ti­fi­ca­tion. Typ­i­cal­ly, fire sci­ence cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is earned through suc­cess­ful­ly com­plet­ing a fire sci­ence cer­tifi­cate online NFPA (the Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion) pro­gram or an NFPA- based pro­gram at a local pro­fes­sion­al school. At any degree lev­el (even a master’s degree) pro­fes­sion­als in emer­gency response can ben­e­fit from fur­ther train­ing and certifications.

NFPA — The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Association

The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion is a non­prof­it advo­ca­cy group that was found in 1896. NFPA mem­ber­ship exceeds more than 50,000 mem­bers. The NFPA oper­ates inde­pen­dent­ly of any gov­ern­ment, as it is glob­al­ly self-fund­ed. NFPA’s mis­sion is to mitigate

• Eco­nom­ic Loss
• Injuries
• Loss of Life
• Loss of Property

The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion orga­nizes and dis­sem­i­nates infor­ma­tion across the world regard­ing fire safe­ty stan­dards, fire sci­ence research, fire­fight­ing train­ing, and fire sci­ence edu­ca­tion, through con­fer­ences, advo­ca­cy part­ners and members.

Addi­tion­al­ly, the NFPA pro­vides grants and awards for achieve­ments such as:

• Dis­tin­guished Contributions
• Fire Loss Advocacy
• Fire Sci­ence Edu­ca­tor of the Year
• Tech­no­log­i­cal Devel­op­ment in Fire Safety

There are many afford­able fire safe­ty cer­ti­fi­ca­tion online pro­grams that meet the edu­ca­tion­al stan­dards set forth by the Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion; how­ev­er, many employ­ers offer to absorb the cost of the pro­gram, essen­tial­ly mak­ing the fire safe­ty online train­ing free.

NFPA Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion

The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion has set forth stan­dards for sev­er­al lev­els of cer­ti­fi­ca­tion for fire offi­cers. Each school that offers fire safe­ty cer­ti­fi­ca­tion online cours­es makes the deci­sion as to which of the NFPA online cer­ti­fi­ca­tion cours­es to offer.

• Fire Inspec­tor Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion (Both Levels)
• Fire Plan Exam­in­er Certification
• Fire Pro­tec­tion Spe­cial­ist Certification
• Oth­er Pro­fes­sion­al Certifications

The fire indus­try offers oth­er cer­ti­fi­ca­tions through these indus­try pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions and over­sight agen­cies, includ­ing the Nation­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Fire Inves­ti­ga­tors and the Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Arson Investigators.

Stu­dents are advised to deter­mine if these pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions offer any fire safe­ty online train­ing free programs.

What Jobs Can You Get with a Fire Science Degree?

What jobs can you get with a fire sci­ence degree? Many fire­fight­ers and EMS or EMT (emer­gency med­ical tech­ni­cian) pro­fes­sion­als begin with a high school diplo­ma or asso­ciate degree (AAS) from com­mu­ni­ty col­lege. That’s fine for entry-lev­el pub­lic safe­ty careers. But through expe­ri­ence and earn­ing certifications/advanced degrees, a fire pro­fes­sion­al can advance to the upper lev­els of jobs with­in the fire depart­ment. These ele­vat­ed fire depart­ment jobs include fire sci­ence degree jobs like Fire Chief, Fire Cap­tain, and Fire Inves­ti­ga­tor among oth­ers. So what can you do with a fire sci­ence degree?

Fire pro­fes­sion­als typ­i­cal­ly prep for their fire­fight­ing career by attend­ing a fire acad­e­my (or anoth­er train­ing facil­i­ty). Grad­u­ates who hold a fire sci­ence degree enter the fire jobs mar­ket pre­pared for the many fire jobs in the field of fire sci­ence and fire­fight­ing. Jobs with­in the fire depart­ment include:

• Arson Inves­ti­ga­tor Jobs
• Fire And Emer­gency Ser­vices Admin­is­tra­tion Jobs
• Fire Inspec­tor Jobs
• Fire Pro­tec­tion Engineer
• Fire Pro­tec­tion Engi­neer­ing Jobs
• Fire Safe­ty Engineers
• Fire Ser­vice Admin­is­tra­tion Jobs
• Fire Mar­shal
• Emer­gency Med­ical Ser­vices Director

As a reminder, many spe­cif­ic fire depart­ment jobs require the attain­ment of indus­try cer­ti­fi­ca­tions and advanced fire sci­ence degrees. These include:

• Arson Inves­ti­ga­tor Jobs
• Fire Inspec­tor Jobs
• Fire Pro­tec­tion Engi­neer­ing Jobs
• Fire Safe­ty Jobs

Where Do Fire Science Professionals Work?

Oth­er than rur­al areas that oper­ate with most­ly vol­un­teer fire­fight­ers, most pro­fes­sion­al fire­fight­ers are employed by either a gov­ern­ment agency. How­ev­er, some fire pro­fes­sion­als work in large fac­to­ries and even air­ports. A fire pro­tec­tion engi­neer that attacks for­est fires by air is known as a smoke jumper. As one can see based on just this exam­ple, it is chal­leng­ing to find a con­sis­tent fire safe­ty offi­cer job descrip­tion across the board.

Local gov­ern­ments employ most fire­fight­ers, but some work in air­ports and fac­to­ries. Wood­land fire­fight­ers are specif­i­cal­ly trained to put out fires and for­est envi­ron­ments and a fire­fight­er in the posi­tion of smoke jumper puts out for­est fires from the sky. A fire sci­ence career can take you near­ly anywhere!

Fire sci­ence degree jobs often require fire pro­fes­sion­als, like a fire pro­tec­tion engi­neer, will often spend time in the field con­duct­ing inspec­tions & research, edu­cat­ing the pub­lic regard­ing fire safe­ty issues and fire safe­ty laws.

There are many oth­er career paths as well:

• law enforce­ment
• para­medic
• crim­i­nal justice
• home­land security
• wild­land protection
• build­ing codes

Salary Expectations for Fire Science Degree Holders

The aver­age fire sci­ence degree salary dif­fers based upon expe­ri­ence, edu­ca­tion lev­el, and cer­ti­fi­ca­tions achieved, as well one’s exact title/responsibilities. Have you con­sid­ered the following?

How much does a fire chief make? Or,
How much is a fire inspec­tor salary?

The fol­low­ing fire-relat­ed careers will have dif­fer­ent com­pen­sa­tion pack­ages, accord­ing to Payscale data:

• Fire Admin­is­tra­tion Salary – $54,000
• Fire Cap­tain Salary – $75,000
• Fire Inspec­tor Salary – $52,000
• Fire Inves­ti­ga­tor Salary – $57,000
• Fire Safe­ty Offi­cer Salary – $58,000

Fire­fight­er Income Facts

Accord­ing to the Bureau of Labor Sta­tis­tics (BLS), a firefighter’s medi­an annu­al income for 2018 was about $49,600. This would include a fire safe­ty offi­cer salary as well. The gen­er­al job out­look for jobs with a fire sci­ence degree is 7% through 2026; a job out­look that com­pares to the nation­al aver­age of all jobs.

Accord­ing to the Bureau of Labor Sta­tis­tics (BLS), the more advanced fire tech­nol­o­gy degree jobs with­in the fire indus­try, such as a fire inspec­tor, the medi­an salary for was $60,000 per year. Fire sci­ence degree jobs salary varies, but usu­al­ly gives grad­u­ates a good living.

Have you asked your­self — Where are the fire pro­tec­tion jobs near me? Research­ing the fire indus­try job sta­tis­tics in your com­mu­ni­ty eas­i­ly pro­vides the answer to this ques­tion. The research will also answer the ques­tions — How much does a fire chief make, and which com­mu­ni­ties are hir­ing fire indus­try professionals.

Professional Organizations in Fire Science, Safety, and Prevention

Most indus­tries main­tain pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions, which help fur­ther the pro­fes­sion by sup­port­ing safe­ty stan­dards and mem­ber pro­fes­sion­als. The fire sci­ence indus­try has sev­er­al pro­fes­sion­al asso­ci­a­tions that offer job boards, net­work­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties, edu­ca­tion and train­ing, and com­mu­ni­ty out­reach pro­grams to mem­ber com­pa­nies and mem­ber pro­fes­sion­als. They are the Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Fire Fight­ers and the Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Association.

The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion
The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion (NFPA) is a pri­vate­ly fund­ed non­prof­it asso­ci­a­tion cre­at­ed to reduce the loss of life, loss of prop­er­ty and eco­nom­ic loss caused by a fire event. Mem­ber­ship pro­vides mem­bers with the most up-to-date fire sci­ence indus­try news, an inte­gra­tive net­work of pro­fes­sion­al fire pro­fes­sion­als, and access to the NFPA’s staff regard­ing issues or information.

Since the end of the 19th Cen­tu­ry, the Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion has tak­en the lead as one of the pri­ma­ry fire sci­ence orga­ni­za­tions in terms of:

• Advo­ca­cy
• Com­mu­ni­ty Outreach
• Fire Safe­ty Training
• Fire Safe­ty Research
• Haz­ardous Mate­r­i­al Handling
• World­wide Conferences

The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion Pub­li­ca­tions
One of the ways the NFPA sup­ports the fire sci­ence indus­try is in its pro­pri­etary pub­li­ca­tions. These pub­li­ca­tions include:

• The NFPA Jour­nal-Ded­i­cat­ed to fire sci­ence indus­try news; issued every oth­er month exclu­sive­ly to members
• The NFPA Jour­nal Buy­ers’ Guide – A com­pre­hen­sive con­sumer guide devot­ed to sig­nif­i­cant buy­er con­cerns regard­ing fire prod­ucts, and fire prevention
• The NFPA Jour­nal Lati­noamer­i­cano – The top source in Latin Amer­i­ca for infor­ma­tion regard­ing fire safe­ty, fire pro­tec­tion, and life safe­ty issues
• The NFPA Online Cat­a­log– A down­load­able, sortable cat­a­log of NFPA’s stan­dards and codes, and edu­ca­tion mate­ri­als for the pub­lic. This infor­ma­tion is offered free of charge
• NFPA’s Codes & Standards

The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion is most wide­ly known as the orga­ni­za­tion that set forth the basic indus­try stan­dards and codes designed to improve fire safe­ty pro­ce­dures and reduce the dam­age and loss caused by a fire event. A revi­sion process that has received accred­i­ta­tion from the Amer­i­can Nation­al Stan­dards Insti­tute (ANSI) refines the 300 exist­ing codes and stan­dards on an ongo­ing basis.

The Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion Of Fire Fighters

The Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Fire Fight­ers (IAFF) was estab­lished with a mis­sion to help pro­tect and sup­port IAFF mem­bers — the pro­fes­sion­als who place their lives on the line every day to save oth­ers — and the neigh­bor­hoods and com­mu­ni­ties they work with­in. For exam­ple, each year, the IAFF Foun­da­tion awards schol­ar­ships and grants to forty stu­dents across the coun­try to facil­i­tate their post-sec­ondary edu­ca­tion expenses.

IAFF mem­bers are the first respon­ders who are first on the scene for dis­as­ters that include:

• Acts of War/Aggression
• Civ­il Disturbances
• Nat­ur­al Dis­as­ter like floods, tor­na­does, hur­ri­canes, and tornadoes

The Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Fire Fight­ers offers sup­port imme­di­ate­ly fol­low­ing mass tragedies and nat­ur­al dis­as­ters by deliv­er­ing food, water, cloth­ing, shel­ters, and finan­cial relief. The IAFF Foun­da­tion is ready to sup­port the spous­es and fam­i­lies of fall­en fire­fight­ers by issu­ing finan­cial assis­tance to the chil­dren of the fire pro­fes­sion­al who has made the ulti­mate sacrifice.

The IAFF Fall­en Fire­fight­er Annu­al Memo­r­i­al
Since, 1918, the IAFF Fall­en Fire Fight­er Memo­r­i­al hap­pens each year as it hon­ors the fire­fight­ers who have lost their lives in the line of duty. To access each year’s Wall of Hon­or fol­low this link.

When an IAFF mem­ber or fam­i­ly mem­ber suf­fers a burn injury, the Foun­da­tion pro­vides finan­cial assis­tance and a peer sup­port net­work to ensure they receive prop­er care and treat­ment with their fam­i­lies by their side.

The IAFF Inter­na­tion­al Burn Camp
The IAFF Inter­na­tion­al Burn Camp is held each year in the nation’s cap­i­tal. The burn camp is a 7‑day work­shop for burn sur­vivors with coun­selors spe­cial­ized in train­ing that changes these teenage lives.

Relat­ed Pro­fes­sion­al Associations

• The Nation­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Fire Investigators
• The Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Arson Investigators