The DivCHED Safety Committee would like to know how we can help faculty teach safety better and help faculty and students to work more safely. Please respond to our survey at https://tinyurl.com/DivCHED2022Safety by September 3, 2022. Responses will be used in aggregate to guide the work of the Safety Committee so that we may better fulfill our mission and vision.
The DivCHED Safety Committee welcomes anyone interested in safety education. Our vision is of education that embeds accurate chemical safety instruction at all educational levels, and our mission is to provide resources and strategies to chemical and science educators in order to prepare chemists and others to function safely while using chemicals. We meet in conjunction with the Fall and Spring meetings of the ACS. If you are interested in safety education and interested in getting involved, you are welcome to attend our committee meetings, or contact the Committee co-chairs and we will try to connect you with appropriate people and projects.
Members of the Safety Committee work on a range of projects at the intersection of safety and education. These include collaborative projects with other components of the ACS, always with a focus on bringing the education perspective to safety issues, and the safety perspective to educational issues. We also share information about safety projects and resources to increase all of our awareness; here are a few resources that are still fairly new that we think are of broad interest and utility to DivCHED members.
We encourage you to check out the safety videos available through the ACS YouTube channel, especially the recently released college series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLG7h7fPoH8IZ6i2rfDK0zVoompXayRL_. You can also find at the ACS channel four short animated videos that are easily integrated in safety discussions at any level. Topics of these include Chemical Risk Assessments, Working Along, Quality Data for Safety Experiments, and Ventilation.
With safety being a core value of the ACS, safety resources are proliferating – check out the constantly updating ACS safety webpage (http://acs.org/safety, which re-directs to https://institute.acs.org/lab-safety.html). There you can find recent webinars as well as safety instructional modules. Many of these resources are framed using the RAMP acronym: Recognize Hazards; Assess Risks; Minimize Risk; and Prepare for Emergencies. Members of the DivCHED Safety Committee have contributed to some of these initiatives, as well as contributing to projects more directly sponsored or suggested by the committee.
The Safety Committee welcomes the idea of symposia at national and regional meetings about safety in education. We will be sponsoring a symposium at the Spring 2023 ACS meeting; if you are interested in organizing a safety symposia contact Sue Wiediger (swiedig@siue.edu) or Dave Finster (dfinster@wittenberg.edu) if interested. Some of our members have also presented at regional meetings and we are open to sharing some of those materials if you are developing programming for your area. If there is something you have particular need or interest in, please reach out to the Safety Committee to share your thoughts.
You can also use this QR code to access our survey – please respond by September 3rd, 2022! Thank you!
