OHS Canada 25th Anniversary Best Editorial

Teach Your Children Well

June 2004

Efforts to bolster young worker safety have taken many forms and been delivered in countless settings: the workplace, schools, bus shelters, the stage and even on the Internet. It’s now time to bring parents into the fold and get young worker education a little closer to home.

By: Astrid van den Broek

The skies are grey in Bramalea, a community northwest of Toronto, and the intermittent rain lends a sleepy cast to the day. But despite the weather, there's a Friday-is-finally-here burst of energy inside the auditorium of Bramalea Secondary School.

About 1,000 grades 11 and 12 students are hurriedly filing in. It may be that they're excited to hear what Rob Ellis, a workplace health and safety advocate who lost his son, David, to a work-related accident five years ago, has to say. Or it may be that their most pressing concern is scoring the top bleacher seats for a bird's-eye view of the crowd.

Ellis, dressed in a grey and black suit, makes his way to a bench near the front of the auditorium. Off to the side, he faces the audience, parallel to a large pull-down screen that will display a video that tells his son's story. His head is bowed, hands folded. "I can't watch that video anymore. I have to hide my eyes. I love Dave. I miss Dave," Ellis later tells the students. "I made a big mistake as a dad. I should have asked a lot more questions, but I didn't. I made a mistake."

A student starts the video. Some kids in the audience are quiet; some fidget, whisper or look around as the images flash on the screen. The crowd settles, seemingly transfixed, as the video goes on. It ends and Ellis returns to his place, front and centre.

Ellis tells the students his 18-year-old son was on the second day of work at a local bakery when he got caught in a large dough mixer. David fought for his life, Ellis explains, but lost the battle on the sixth day. Hands fly up over gaping mouths. Eyes are wiped, followed by embarrassed giggles. A connection has been made.

Does anyone have any questions about workplace health and safety? The hands shoot up. Did David know the risks of the job before he started working? What responsibilities do employers have? How should I talk to my boss about this? What laws would Ellis change if he could? Does Ellis blame himself?

Soon Ellis can't keep up and asks that students form a line. They come from all corners of the auditorium, lining up until there is a string of questioning faces two dozen deep.

The African proverb says, "It takes a village to raise a child." It may also take a village to teach youths about occupational health and safety. While the lion's share of training has traditionally fallen to companies, teaching young workers about oh&s today has assumed a multi-faceted approach.

Real-life stories from speakers like Ellis or accident survivors are one way to make that all-important connection with young workers. Then, of course, there's on-line courses, oh&s in school curriculum, videos, advertising, and contests that challenge youth to prove their health and safety knowledge.

But there may be yet another way to tap the oh&s message, like an urgent Morse code, closer to home. It's an approach with which Ellis is painfully aware: the role of the parent. Representatives for companies, workers' compensation boards (WCBs) and educators alike say parents need to be more aware of what their sons and daughters are doing on the job. "Parents need to ask those questions of the child. They need to ask the questions from the employer. They need to become involved to a greater level of awareness in the child's work," says George Stewart, oh&s director for Prince Edward Island's WCB.

But why do we rely on all these different approaches to raising oh&s awareness among young people in the first place? Is it not redundant to have layer-upon-layer of the same message in schools, on websites and, now, at home?

Wendy McIsaac, youth education coordinator for the WCB in PEI, doesn't think so. "In using different methods, you have a better chance of helping that young worker," McIsaac says. "With a wide variety of personalities, you have to appeal to different learning styles. People do not learn or receive information in the same way. To do something only one way, you only get that message across to that particular type of learner who understands that particular type of message."

Mary Lou Brodhagen, manager of health and safety and environment at Honeywell Systems, a technology and manufacturing company in Stratford, Ontario, suggests making it real. Don't just pile on the statistics, which may have little meaning or significance to youth, Brodhagen says.

"Personal stories work really well," she says, but cautions against focusing exclusively on fatalities. "Yes, it's important to discuss it. But it's more important to talk about the accidents where people aren't the same, where they've got a scar, where they're missing fingers or they're burned. Death is not a reality to kids because they think they're invincible," Brodhagen contends.

Other approaches that may have some appeal to youth include gentle questioning, emphasizing the consequence of actions and, of course, having parents be models for good behaviour at home (definitely no mowing the grass in flip-flops).

One retail official in British Columbia likens a varied approach to advertising and the effectiveness of a widespread media buy. The more you hear a particular product mentioned, says Laurie Lowes, manager of health and safety for London Drugs Ltd. in Richmond, British Columbia, the more that product will be top of mind. Like any major societal change, Lowes suggests a multi-faceted approach will help get you to where you want to go -- slowly but surely.

And it may be that having parents discuss workplace safety basics with their kids -- at home and often -- can help cement a positive message. That may be why a growing number of companies is trying to bring parents into the oh&s circle.

Why are parents thinking about their role more these days? Between speakers encouraging parents to get involved, companies reaching out to parents, and provincial ministries and WCBs finding new ways of targeting parents, the issue is fast gaining profile.

Until recently, for the most part, parents operated on blind faith that employers would take great care with respect to the care of their children.

In talking with other local retailers about workplace safety, Lowes reports being unpleasantly surprised to learn about the lack of parental awareness. "They'd tell their children to look both ways when they cross the street, and sit up straight and don't talk to strangers," she says of parents. "But when your child went to work, it was, 'What time are you going to be home for dinner?' Nothing about, 'Gee, how's work? What are you doing there?'"

Karen Zukas, manager of the Strategic Initiatives Prevention Division for British Columbia's WCB, concurs. "We talk to our kids about buckling up, about not drinking and driving and appointing a designated driver, and not doing drugs. Well, the same words of advice also apply to the workplace."

To Lowes's way of thinking, parents should serve as a double-check, someone to ask questions that need to be asked. Did the employer teach you how to properly use that piece of equipment? What happens if you drop something into the mixer?

It's similar to teaching children, Lowes suggests. Parents may think it's the role of teachers and the school system to educate children. But, really, teachers and educators are just setting the foundation for learning and skill-building. For health and safety, parents need to pick up on these issues at home.

"The parental role in educating [young people] lays the groundwork from an early age," Zukas says. The idea is that when teens enter the work force, they will be more receptive to training. "They'll have some awareness and appreciation that the workplace can be dangerous," she adds.

But given the tensions that often exist between teenagers and their parents, is it not likely this approach could be counterproductive? Or, worse, regarded as intrusive by teens.

"We heard some of that feedback from parents who said their children might interpret their interest in workplace health and safety as interference into their lives," Zukas notes. That said, she adds, parents should not retreat and should realize they do have a role to play in their children's health and safety on the job. Some research shows teens may set greater stock by what their peers say than what their parents say, Zukas acknowledges, but those studies also indicate that long-term values, such as using a safe approach, stick for life.

Young people may listen to what their parents say more than we think, but what parents say needs to make sense, suggests Kathy Lynn, a Vancouver-based parent educator and founder of Parenting Today Productions. It may be helpful to bring up the subject at the dinner table, asking a youth about his or her new job and responsibilities, Lynne says. An "inquisition" approach, no doubt, will yield less than desired results.

"They respond better if we talk to them as thinking people with their own ideas and, in fact, when communicating with teens, we need to do a tremendous amount of listening to find out where they're coming from," Lynn says.

"I think now there's a slow ground swell of employers starting to realize that there is that need to at least advise some parents of the risks in the workplace," says Lowes, who adds London Drugs adopted just such an approach a little more than a year ago. For each new young employee, a letter is sent home that outlines the potential risks a young worker may face on the job.

While some workplaces are showing interest in the idea, Lowes says, others are questioning why the approach is necessary. "They're saying, 'You're laying it out on the line exactly what the risks are?' And we're saying what's the harm in putting it right out there up front rather than having a parent come to me and saying, 'My God, I had no idea you had these problems."

Since the letter was released, the company's accident rate has dropped. Lowes admits, however, that the downward move isn't solely attributable to the letter.

The company's claims costs have dropped about 20 per cent since 2000 even though staff levels have climbed by approximately the same percentage. The young worker letter is believed to have contributed to the decrease, but it's also the result of increased efforts overall with respect to workplace health and safety. London Drugs, for example, has introduced multiple wellness programs, renewed insistence on monthly oh&s meetings at stores, and benefited from a WCB-sponsored oh&s guide for new retail workers.

Halfway across the country in Stratford, Ontario, Honeywell Systems is also hoping to reap the benefits of parental involvement. Along with sending home oh&s-themed videos and colouring books that Honeywell employees can use to discuss safety with their children, the subject has become a regular topic at the monthly safety meeting with workers.

Every company should have home safety as part of its training, Brodhagen suggests. "We should feel obligated to educate our employees on how to educate their kids about this," she says. "Educating those kids provides me with safer workers one day. If we get our workers to go home and talk to their kids about it, we end up hiring a lot of people's kids either for summer or a decade down the road, and we'll have more aware kids coming into our workplace."

Astrid Van Den Broek is a freelance writer in Toronto.

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HIGH MARKS

If parents are acting as a double-check to help their teens become oh&s-savvy, then what's the role of other approaches? Weaving oh&s issues through student curriculum, especially when these efforts begin in junior grades, can lay the foundation for oh&s awareness. Last June, Prince Edward Island's WCB introduced a mascot called Stella the Safety Skunk. While helping to educate grade one students about pedestrian and playground safety, Stella personifies the safe attitude that educators are hoping to instill.

"So, yes, they're years away from going into a workplace," Wendy McIsaac, youth education coordinator for PEI's WCB, says of the first-graders. "The earlier you start, the research bears us out, the better chance you have of actually helping to form that attitude towards health and safety," McIsaac says. "By the time they're ready to go into the work force, health and safety will be a part of the way they view the world."

Cross the country and British Columbia's WCB initially focused on grades 10 through 12. WCB statistics show that about half of students in grade 10 are beginning to work, work part-time or have summer jobs, says Karen Zukas, manager of the Strategic Initiatives Prevention Division at the board. More recently, the WCB has changed its tack for student education and is now also aiming lower -- right down to kindergarten.

At Ontario's Workplace Safety and Insurance Board in Toronto, marketing director Elizabeth Turnbull says many of the organization's awareness strategies still rely on traditional methods -- advertising. And much of that advertising -- whether on the radio, in print or in public transit shelters -- is centred on summer employment opportunities. This is a tried-and-true way of raising awareness, Turnbull says, adding that the proof is in the numbers.

A pre-survey of about 300 youths in 1999 asked where they ranked top personal concerns according to four subjects: workplace health and safety, drinking and driving, teen pregnancy and excessive speeding. Oh&s placed fourth. Since then, consecutive surveys show workplace safety has climbed to the number two spot.

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ON-LINE CONNECTION

While traditional approaches certainly have their place, the Internet is a truly new tool for getting the oh&s message to teens. "We know that youth are very comfortable going online because it's relatively anonymous, they don't have to feel embarrassed, they don't have to worry that their employer might know that they're looking at this information," says Elizabeth Turnbull of Ontario's WSIB.

And that's probably the biggest selling point for the Internet. It offers universal access, saves money and is always there to provide information, says Paul Kells, executive director and founder of www.passporttosafety.com, and father of a young worker fatally injured in a work accident. A general oh&s test can be completed online (it cannot be printed and done elsewhere). Roughly 30 per cent of the 10,000 visitors to the six-month-old site have taken the oh&s test, Kells says, adding that he is optimistic those numbers will grow as prime student work season begins.

"With a few strokes and a keyboard, it gets you set up for a foundation," Kells says. "That's what I think is so important about on-line delivery. It provides an opportunity we've truly never had before. Brochures, pamphlets, advertising stuff -- we've been doing that for a 100 years and it doesn't work."

It's tempting to focus on the Internet, says Karen Zukas of British Columbia's WCB. "While the on-line materials and educational training programs can be useful, it's not applicable to some youth. So we have a combination of both [online and printed] available."

There's no certainty that the Internet will deliver the goods when it comes to improving young worker safety, Kells acknowledges. "But at least we know that in two seconds, without spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on mail outs, once we connect with somebody."

The www.passporttosafety.com website, Kells emphasizes, is designed to work in conjunction with other oh&s awareness efforts. "That's the huge challenge -- people must never assume that this is the end. It's only the beginning and it builds the foundation," he says.

"For us to pretend that, say, classroom teaching is better than on-the-job awareness, you've got the blinders on," Kells says. He underscores a view held by many program creators -- the one about the village and the child -- and the need to recognize that each program fits together in bits and pieces.

Adds Zukas, "It's truly like a puzzle, fitting together, and collectively they are all important and they all work in synergy with one another and reinforce the message or the program. They all combine together to create this synergy."

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MORE THAN PLAY

Having students hit the stage is the theme of yet another way to teach young people about workplace health and safety -- high school, student-developed drama plays.

Joe Who? is a videotape of a peer-to-peer play developed by a drama class from McNair Secondary School in Richmond, British Columbia. It addresses oh&s through the theme of what can happen when young workers don't ask for help. (See "New Kid on the Block", ohs canada, June, 2003.)

It's a concept Ontario's Industrial Accident Prevention Association (IAPA) recently picked up on through its Learning Innovative New Knowledge (LINK) Youth Health and Safety Forum. The LINK program, which has been around since early 2000, has long involved approaches that include relating the personal stories of injured young workers and presenting information on various safety matters.

This year, however, LINK is piloting its own peer-to-peer play program. Two senior drama classes from Chatham Kent Secondary School researched, developed and performed a play about young worker oh&s through the LINK program. They worked from a resource binder provided by the IAPA, and aside from having to cover issues such as rights and responsibilities, had creative freedom to present exactly what they wanted. Excerpts of the play were shown at IAPA's annual conference.

The success of the pilot project has IAPA officials thinking about rolling out the approach in other communities. "It's engaging the creativity of the drama students to come up with their own unique and original way to spread the message of occupational health and safety to their peers," says Carolynn George, head of the IAPA's Community and Youth Initiatives Program.