1. Brianna Ridings
Senior Boards Speech
Ms. Tillery
A building is on fire the natural instinct for humans is to run out but what about the few
running in? I think their time to think about the few that are running in the blazing building. Hi
my name is Brianna Ridings and for my senior project my goal was to grasp a better
understanding of what is involved in being a firefighter. To do this I decided to create a
documentary showing parts of the job that is not always glorified such as; how the job is
physically and emotionally and mentally demanding. This was my choice of topic because my
family has been a part of the firefighting services ever since I was born with my grandpa and
father both picking firefighting as there occupation. This interest me because growing up I did
not understand where my dad went every third day since that is when he would go to attend to
his shift for 24 hours. The desire to learn more is what lead me to this topic.
After deciding my project topic I began researching on the history of the fire department
and what the basics of the job. From my research I learned that fire is made from three main
components which are fuel, heat and oxygen, which are elements that have been around since the
beginning of time. Since the beginning of man, fire has been considered an evil force of nature.
This is because fire has caused much construction in the past. The earliest record of fire was in
the Roman days. It started with having men watch over the town with only having water buckets
to put the fire out. Later on the technology changed where there was a bell system, to axes, then
to horse drug carriages filled with water which all lead up to what is used today such as the fire
engine, computers, ambulance, and the turnout gear being just a few main examples. I choose to

2. create a documentary for my product because I thought that it would be the best way for me to
see the emotion from the questions I was interested in asking. Also I believed that making a
interview based documentary would be the most impactful was to inform my audience who
might view my video that wanted to know what the job consisted of.
My first step to creating a interview based documentary was by getting together what
specific questions together what I wanted to ask the firemen. This is when my project facilitator
became a help. All these men have made my project possible because they are all the captains
and chiefs of Johns Creek Fire Department. However my project facilitator specifically was
Matt Broderick. I picked him as my project facilitator because he has been in the fire services
for 22 years in three of the busiest cities in the nation. These are New York, DeKalb, and Johns
Creek. With his help I was able to come up with five basic simple questions but they were still
questions that were good enough to get a deep response that I was looking for. With my
questions chosen I spent many days and hours at Johns Creek Firehouse 63. There the crew all
openly let me come observe, have dinners, and taught me what it really meant to be a firefighter.
However, this is when I ran into some problems. Since being a firefighter is not a 9-5 job it was
difficult to schedule time for me to go to the station. A shift works every third day for 24 hours
and I had permission to work with two out of the three shifts. Plus the factor of the crew having
to train, go to certain events or getting a call were all issues that I had to learn to understand
quickly. Another problem I have had to deal with was technology. Since I made a video I had
many issues with editing not saving, and with movie maker and my computer not working.
Throughout the process I have learned that firefighting is a job that takes more than just
putting out a fire its learning how to deal with emotional things and staying physically fit. After
seeing first-hand the emotional part of the job I would not choose this as a profession. From this

3. experience I have gained much more respect for firefighters because they are everyday heroes.
Even if a shift does not get one call that day they still spend most of their time preparing for the
possibility that they might have to save a life. At this point I will like to thank you for your time
and do you have any questions for me?