Identifying the Scope of Safety Issues and Challenges to Safety Management in Swedish Middle School and High School Chemistry Education

Abstract

Chemical safety management is an iterative process where reviews of safety deficiencies (e.g., inspection notes) and failures (e.g., injuries) guide improvement efforts. The present work investigates safety in the school chemistry laboratory through two substudies. First, we interviewed 10 Swedish middle and high school chemistry teachers about how they work with safety and accident prevention in the chemistry laboratory. Second, we analyzed the call records of the Swedish Poisons Information Centre (PIC) concerning 10–19 olds and reports regarding severe injuries and accidents submitted to the Swedish Work Environment Authority (SWEA). The interviewed teachers encounter problems with chemical safety related to deficiencies in organizational support, such as lack of time and resources for preventive risk management and assignment to groups that are too large. The major safety challenge was reported to lie in students’ safety behavior. Although facilities were generally well-equipped we noted outdated safety data sheets and missing written risk assessments. For 2010–2014, the PIC records identified 637 cases of chemical exposures at schools; of these, 243 (38%) concerned laboratory chemicals at school. The PIC experts on call judged 70% of the cases involving laboratory chemicals to pose a risk to the exposed students, mainly due to acids and alkali. Inhalation was the most frequent exposure route, although skin and eyes were almost equally frequent. Strikingly, PIC data identified 10 times as many cases as the SWEA injury/incident data. Hence, PIC data can provide knowledge about chemical safety incidents at schools not otherwise available.

Probing Physical Sciences Teachers’ Chemical Laboratory Safety Awareness in Some South African High Schools

“…inspection notes) and failures (e.g. injuries) guide improvement efforts (Schenk et al, 2018). Discourse on school CLS provides opportunities to develop safety awareness among science teachers, which could have a positive impact on current efforts to encourage inquiry-based learning (Ramnarain & Hobden, 2015) through laboratory work.…”

“…While laboratory chemical safety awareness is prioritised in developed countries, it is often neglected in poorer countries (Eguna et al, 2011;Kandel, 2017). For Schenk et al, (2018), some of the challenges on CLS safety practices and awareness stem from large classes and teachers' inadequate understanding of adolescent behavioural patterns. In the same study, most teachers suggested that the number of students permitted in a laboratory for a particular experiment should be limited to 16 (Schenk et al, 2018).…”

“…For Schenk et al, (2018), some of the challenges on CLS safety practices and awareness stem from large classes and teachers' inadequate understanding of adolescent behavioural patterns. In the same study, most teachers suggested that the number of students permitted in a laboratory for a particular experiment should be limited to 16 (Schenk et al, 2018). These aspects are of considerable concern in the South African schooling system where class sizes have been reported to be very large (Ramatlapana & Makonye, 2013).…”

“…These aspects are of considerable concern in the South African schooling system where class sizes have been reported to be very large (Ramatlapana & Makonye, 2013). While some of the shortcomings in laboratory safety may be as a result of constrained budgets (Eguna et al, 2011) or simply because of teachers' uncertainty about how to deal with adolescents behavioural challenges in confined spaces (Schenk et al, 2018), many of the shortcomings may be because teachers are not aware of the safety requirements and procedures.…”

Calls made to the Poisons Information Centre reveal need for improved risk management of cleaning agents in the workplace

“…Overviews of injuries and incidents provide an important basis for injury prevention and may identify problematic uses of chemicals or groups at risk. Data from calls made to poisons information centres have been used to investigate chemical injuries in schools [1,2] and in the workplace [3][4][5][6][7] as well as for specific target groups such as pesticide exposures [8], workers in small enterprises [9], military personnel [10] and adolescent workers [11][12][13]. A recent comparison between the occupational cases found in the Swedish Poisons Information Centre (PIC) database and the official statistics of the Swedish Work Environment Authority (SWEA) showed that these two data sources reveal somewhat different pictures of chemical accidents at work [7].…”