Educational Visits - Good Practice, Risks and Hazards.

Written by Paddy Swan


Continued from page 1

1.Identifyrepparttar presence of a potential hazard.

2.Assessrepparttar 109286 risk to health and safety.

3.Eliminaterepparttar 109287 hazard if practicable.

4.If not practicable, reducerepparttar 109288 risk by separating people from it.

5.If this is not practicable, reducerepparttar 109289 risk by protecting repparttar 109290 person.

6.Provide colleagues and pupils with information about health and safety risks and training inrepparttar 109291 use of control measures and equipment.

This can be easily summarised into a series of steps:

Step One - Look forrepparttar 109292 Hazards

Step Two - Decide who might be harmed and how.

Step Three - Evaluaterepparttar 109293 risks and decide whether existing precautions are sufficient or more needs to be done.

Step Four - Record your findings

Step Five - Review your assessment and decide whether you need to revise it.

This is particularly important on visits where conditions such as weather may change. This is sometimes referred to as ongoing Risk Assessment, but in fact it is simply a re-iteration ofrepparttar 109294 review atge.

Hazards on Visits

The hazards for any Visit or Trip fall into three clear areas which can be addressed to identify sources of hazard. These are :-

i. Safer Physical Environment ii. People/Procedures (Harm reduction/Incidents) iii. External Impacts e.g Transportation or Weather

If you imagine a pupil on a skiing trip slipping on ice, they may come to no harm, break a bone or, indeed, break their neck.

If a school bus has a defect onrepparttar 109295 brakes there may be a skid with no casualties, a minor accident or a major accident causing death.

We need to recognise that hazard outcomes are largely unpredictable and we can only progress by taking a “loss prevention” approach where we look at expected outcomes and repparttar 109296 numbers which are likely to be affected.

The important point is that identification and control of hazards has now become a legal management requirement (cf. Management of Health and Safety Regulations - Regulation 4) andrepparttar 109297 types of hazard which we need to address in school and on school visits include issues set out underrepparttar 109298 DfES Guidances including Guidances on Visits- 1998).

For ease of approach hazards may be classified byrepparttar 109299 following categories :-

Class "A" Hazard A condition or practice likely to cause permanent disability, loss of life or body part (e.g. an eye).

Many visit based incidents including road traffic accidents and involving water based activities have been proven to fall into this category.

A condition or practice likely to cause extensive loss of structure, equipment or material (typically hazards from fire, electricity and machines).

For example, flammables being stored incorrectly and near sources of ignition.

Class "B" Hazard

A condition or practice likely to cause serious injury or illness (resulting in temporary disability) or property damage that disrupts, but is less severe than Class "A", e.g. slippery conditions on a skiing holiday or a broken tread atrepparttar 109300 top ofrepparttar 109301 stairs in a hotel.

Class "C" Hazard

A condition or practice likely to cause minor (non-disabling) injury or illness, or non-disruptive property damage, e.g. build-up of clutter in a room being used for teaching or as a base during an activity holiday.

Measuring Risk

Risk can be understood asrepparttar 109302 measure of Probability and Hazard.

Probability of Occurrence

Once you have considered what could happen, you should ask yourself "how often?" andrepparttar 109303 simple categories are :-

Frequent Probability Occasional Probability Rare Probability

The notion of frequency will vary depending onrepparttar 109304 activity and might be considered in :- • Number of People. • Hours in contact with pupils or duration of visit Using bothrepparttar 109305 ideas of Hazard and Occurrencerepparttar 109306 following table can be created :-

Minor Hazard - C 3 2 1

Serious Hazard - B 7 5 4

Major Hazard - A 9 8 6 Frequency (High) (Low) (Moderate)

From this table and approach a HIRA may be produced which has an indication of seriousness of a potential Risk and givesrepparttar 109307 Group Leader/EVC a method of prioritising Risk Reduction.

Recording your HIRAs

The method set out inrepparttar 109308 previous section allows a set of priorities to be drawn up and resources, financial or human, set accordingly.

Obviously, major hazards with high frequency should be given repparttar 109309 highest level of attention. Any item or area scoring 6 or above should be highlighted for specific attention and a copy ofrepparttar 109310 Assessment should be passed to eitherrepparttar 109311 school EVC orrepparttar 109312 Headteacher on completion.

You will find Specific Hazard and Risk Assessment forms for Visits and Trips contained withinrepparttar 109313 DfES Guidance for Visits at www.dfes.gov.uk.

This document gives fuller listings onrepparttar 109314 particular hazard and risks to be addressed during planning for visits.

If it wasn’t written down - it didn’t happen.

Any staff involved in an incident should always make notes or fill out an incident/ casualty report on any event attended, no matter how minor.

Proper records will help you to recallrepparttar 109315 incident if you are ever asked about it at a later stage. The responsibility is greater if you have a role as a Group Leader or a teacher first aider. attending an incident or a teacher administering medicines to a pupil.

Records may be used in a court, so ensure that your report or notes are accurate, factual, contain all relevant information, and are based on observations rather than opinions.

Your role as a Group Leader on any visit makes it important that all your actions are recorded, especially as these actions pertain to your HIRA.

When preparing any report some general guidelines should be followed:

•Use ink only.

•Any corrections should be crossed out with a single line and initialled. Do not use correction fluid to correct any mistakes.

•Sign and daterepparttar 109316 record.

•The information should be kept confidential, and should only be accessed by authorised people.

•In any medical incident, a copy of any report, especially of any treatment at site,should be also sent torepparttar 109317 A&E Department atrepparttar 109318 hospital withrepparttar 109319 patient.

A Final Word

A prosecution is only made in exceptional circumstances where a Police and HSE Investigations show elements of gross negligence sorepparttar 109320 advice to followrepparttar 109321 simple rules of good practice will keep you secure. Remember no one has ever been prosecuted for following good safety practice.

Dr.Paddy Swan is a qualified teacher with senior management experiencein UK schools and colleges. He has almost 30 years experience in developing some 100 Safe Systems of Work training solutions for industrial clients. Paddy is the author of School Basic Safety for Classroom and Support staff for UK schools and the Headteacher's Safety Managment Toolkit These may be seen at http://www.swaneducation.co.uk


Educate yourself on the toxins in your home.

Written by Bruce Bowery


Continued from page 1
but I will say that there are many sites that discussrepparttar toxin issue in our homes. Do your families and yourself a favor and research this. I know that we have used these types of products for years and that our parents have usedrepparttar 109285 same products even longer, but does that make things right? I am here at StnypntNc@aol.com if you would like to discuss this further.

I am a loving husband and father of two beautiful girls ages 7 and 4. I have been looking into household toxins, and am confident that we can make a positive change in our homes for the betterment of our families.


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