The family behind the Keep the Pressure kits placed in every single junior high and high school classroom in Santa Clarita joined with leaders from the William S. Hart Union High School District in presenting kits to School Resource Officers to be kept in their squad cars.

The kits include a tourniquet, clotting gauze and other essential items intended to stop dangerous levels of bleeding due to an accident or other trauma.

Santa Clarita sisters Cambria and Maci Lawrence, along with their parents Dr. Bud Lawrence and Dr. Regan Lawrence, created the Keep the Pressure kits with the objective to place one in every classroom. Having successfully raised enough money to place a kit in all 1,100 classrooms in the Hart School District, the girls are looking to expand their reach.

“I’m just so grateful to be given the opportunity to be able to help (the School Resource Officers) and to know, not only are we helping in the classrooms, but to help those who help us back in return,” Cambria said.

“It’s great to know that even though the kits are in the classrooms already, if (law enforcement) has them then it can also help save people’s lives,” Maci added.

Hart School District Deputy Superintendent Mike Kuhlman, who partnered with the Lawrence family early on to help get these life-saving tools in every classroom of the district, said extending the program to include Sheriff’s deputies is “another example of ways we are working to keep our students and staff safe.”

“We have these amazing community partners who have stepped in and helped make this possible for us,” Kuhlman said, referring to the Lawrence family. “And so we have now provided these kits not only in every classroom of our school sites, but with our partners in law enforcement.”

The objective Cambria and Maci had when developing the kits was to have them used as soon as the trauma has happened, and that is exactly what the deputies need.

“Deputies are the first to respond to accidents and this right here is perfect for an accident scene,” said Deputy Tom Drake, the SRO at Saugus High School.

“Our commitment at the hospital is to give back to the community with the Stop the Bleed education,” Dr. Lawrence said. “But that’s just education. There is actually a void of having the tools to help save someone’s life. You can know what to do, but if you don’t have the right instruments to do it, it’s of little use.”

For more information on these kits, go to keepthepressure.com.