Overcoming Disaster: What Colleges Learned from Catastrophe to Recovery provides a resource to help leaders at many levels in an organization understand what can help and hinder their disaster recovery, whether natural or man-made caused. The author and contributors share their lessons learned on recovering from hurricanes and a mass shooting on campus where nine were killed. The seven parts of the book include the aftermath to recovery with chapters on trauma and grief, being overwhelmed, healing, and recovery strategies for individuals, organizations and communities. The finale of the book is a master crisis response cheat sheet.

Katherine Persson was a founding faculty member and a long-time college president of Lone Star College-Kingwood when Hurricane Harveys sewage-laden floodwaters washed over eighty percent of everything on the main campus just before the start of 2017 fall classes. With 113 classrooms lost, LSC-Kingwood built a new instructional business plan and started classes 27 days after flooding with no employee layoffs, and an increase in student enrollment of over five percent for that eventful first semester.

Dedication

Preface

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Part 1: What Happened

Chapter 1: Lone Star College-Kingwood

Chapter 2: Gulf Coast State College

Chapter 3: Umpqua Community College

Part II: Hindsight: What We Wish We Knew

Chapter 4: The Settings

Chapter 5: Dont Be Naïve

Chapter 6: Guns, Drugs and Money

Chapter 7: Power

Chapter 8: Move Things to a Higher Place

Chapter 9: Identity Theft

Chapter 10: Loss of Personal Items and Loss of Lives

Chapter 11: What You Should Know and Do to Help Recovery Efforts

Part III: What Helped Us

Chapter 12: Leadership Team

Chapter 13: Culture

Chapter 14: Policies

Chapter 15: Resources

Chapter 16: Friends, Partners, and Others Wanting to Help

Part IV: What Hindered Us

Chapter 17: Inexperience

Chapter 18: FEMA and Other Bureaucracies

Chapter 19: Procurement Policies

Chapter 20: Personnel Changes

Part V: Aftermath to Recovery

Chapter 21: Trauma and Grief

Chapter 22: Overwhelming State of Mind

Chapter 23: Healing and Recovering

Chapter 24: Recovery Strategies Used by Individuals

Chapter 25: Recovery Strategies Used Organizations

Chapter 26: Community Healing

Part VI: Preparation for the Next Crisis A Global Pandemic

Part VII: Master Crisis Response Cheat Sheet

Closing Statement

Appendix A:Harvey Timeline Summary: August 23, 2017 - February 2020

Appendix B.LSC-Kingwood Student Success Pre and Post Harvey

Appendix C:Harvey Revenues and Expenses

Appendix D:LSC Procurement Process

Appendix E:Testimonials from Student, Staff, and Faculty

References

About the Author

About the Contributors