Safety
Safety and shop operations go hand-in-hand for the Gearheads and the 2007-2008 school year brought renewed emphasis on putting Safety FIRST.
Due to major reconstruction work at the high school, at the end of the 2007 school, the Gearheads needed to relocated from our large team rooms and shared workshop to a single, much smaller team room with smaller storage and machine rooms, and a smaller workshop space shared with the school's small engine class. We used this opportunity to do serious 'spring cleaning', separate the team tools from school class tools, inventory and carefully organize our tools, equipment and supplies into a new team home, with safety in mind every step of the way.
Our goal for this season was to make safety transparent – by that we mean safety becomes ingrained habit and way of life for all team members. Safety was the Gearheads stated #1 goal for this year and to accomplish this goal, we:
- Organized our new team rooms with the idea that "everything has a home"
Everything has a home: even Gearheads' personal stuff!
- Made safety a standing meeting agenda topic
- Issued new ANSI Z87.1 compliant shop safety glasses to each team member
- Created a spare safety glasses case box for use by guests, team members, both in our work spaces and at competitions
Spare PPE equipment is always available
- Provided formal pre-build season safety training as well as ongoing training which included:
- General Safety
- Safety Program Overview
- Gearheads at Work: Layout of new team rooms, cleanliness and clutter control, waste, defining and recognizing work zones, dealing with emergencies
- Dress for Success: Know your Personal Protection Equipment (PPE)
- Act Like A STAR: Stop, Think, Act, Review
- Use the Right Tool for the Job
- This safety training covered the hand tools that the Gearheads have and use such are measuring, cutting, drilling, fasteners, shaping/filing, hand sawing, basic wiring and connector
- Power Tools
- Hands on shop training for using the sander, grinder, drill press, band saw, table saw, metal lathe and computerized mill
- Review of the FIRST Competition Safety Requirements
- Encouraged each team member – students and adults - to be 'safety buddies' by taking responsibility for their themselves but also look out for each others. The "You're Busted!" phrase not only applies to a team member not following good safety practices but also anyone they are working with at time or in the vicinity.
- Enforced new 2007 build season policies such as:
- A team member is not allowed in the shop if they have not completed this year's safety training
- Safety issues are to be pointed out and corrected immediately upon observation
- Repeated safety violations may result in a team member being sent home for the remainder of that day's work session
1. Gearhead safety buddies. 2. Yes, we wear our hair tied back! 3. And we're wearing our safety glasses, too!
A safety reminder on the shop entrance door
Each year the Gearheads Imagery group creates a new SWAG pin design by modifying the Gearhead Yellow Diamond logo – we invite you to get your Safety Gearhead pin at the 2008 Pittsburgh Regional and the 2008 Great Lakes Regional!
