CHALLENGE 1: Plan your school trips.

Do your children go to school unescorted? Or do you hurry to drop them off then rush off to work? Do you operate transport services in your schools?

Make sure the driver, you and your child/children know both the main and alternate routes. In an emergency, roads can be blocked and it’s important to have a backup plan to avoid stress and confusion. When you are confused or stressed, you lose concentration and that could lead to an accident. Stay calm and focused! Teach children to stick to the plan always.

CHALLENGE 2 – Sort out your emergency procedures (Includes a free template)

If you don’t have an emergency procedure, then you need to sit down with your staff and plan one immediately.

Make sure everyone learns the school’s emergency procedures. Include the emergency plans and phone numbers in the school’s handbook and have a brief one-page plans posted in classrooms, staff room, every room you use and along the corridors/hallways.

Getting this sorted quickly will give everyone the confidence to act quickly in emergencies. This can help reduce number of (or prevent) casualties.

CHALLENGE 3 – Get parents involved in Safety.

Let parents know that you want their opinion on how to maintain or increase Safety in the school. They can form a whistle blowing group or partake in planning for emergencies or organise an interactive session with teachers since they are the primary “carers” of their kids when they are in school.

Parents usually worry about the Safety of their children so involving them show that you have their interests at heart.

You can add this to your agenda for your upcoming PTA meeting!

CHALLENGE 4 – Get your students involved in Safety.

One thing we do at my own school is a Safety week. This year (some months ago) we involved the children in KS2 and 3. We assigned some safety topics to them and asked them to work in groups, do their research and present their findings! They did excellently well and learnt alot about Safety on their own.

Give it a try and come back here to tell us how it all went!

CHALLENGE 5 – Get everyone involved in First Aid.

1. The First Aid box.

Every school and workplace should have a First Aid box. Children tend to get hurt during play time so I am sure you have been giving first aid treatment in your schools and are now short on supply. Have you restocked for the term? Put that on your to do list.

2. First Aid Training.

Plan to get your staff trained on Pediatric First Aid and Emergency First Aid at Work.

Then plan to teach your students about First Aid. Train and empower them with the skills to help save a life in event of an emergency.

Is there any child with medical conditions like allergies, asthma, etc? Why not talk to your students about the condition so that they are sympathetic to their friend’s needs and if possible help if there is an emergency.

What do you think? Check out this image which highlights what should go in your First Aid Box!

CHALLENGE 6 – Have an incident reporting policy

Do you have an Incident/accident reporting policy in your school?

Do you know that close calls and observations should be recorded also?

Let’s face it – there is the likelihood that a child will get hurt at school either when playing or involved in a sport activity. There is also the likelihood that some children take ill while at school.

There is also a chance many children have luckily escaped injuries – that is what we call a near miss or a close call.

How do you keep a record if any of this should happen?

To make it easy, I am sharing with you a form we use in our school. On the last page, you will find a brief guide telling you exactly what some of the terms mean.

Why not introduce it into your school and speak to your teachers about using it? Let me know if you do eventually use it and if you found it helpful. Your thoughts and opinions are welcome.

P.S. Very important!

One great reason to ensure the school has a record of incidents is to help protect the school and show that you are on top of your game. Parents need to know exactly what happened as some teachers will try to hide injuries if they can. Let the teachers know there are serious consequences for failed or under-reporting of accidents.

CHALLENGE 7 – Increase security effort

To end this challenge I had the difficulty of choosing from a wide variety of topics but had to choose the security topic and make it the challenge of challenges. Why have I called it the challenge of challenges?

The truth is, security is a big issue especially in Nigeria of today. Parents need peace of mind while at work. They need to know that their children are being protected and are safe. Security guards tend to slack on their duties so they need to be watched and monitored closely.

This is an area I am also having trouble with as I am constantly having to speak to security every 2 weeks or so to keep them in check and to point out things I am not happy with.

They need to understand why security is top of your list and why the lives of children in your care matter to you more than anything in this world. With the way the country is right now, we all have to be vigilant. As we do so, my prayer is that God rewards our diligence and our businesses with great success.

Do you have a security policy in place? Does it work? Don’t you think it is about time you reviewed that policy? What part can your teachers and non-teaching staff play? It shouldn’t be left entirely for the security guard. We are all in this together.