Safety for Agricultural Educators: Evaluation of an Intervention to Enhance Awareness of Agricultural Hazards
Author: May, MD, John J.
Date Published: 2005
Safety for Agricultural Educators (SAGE) is a two-sided fact sheet on agricultural hazards that has been distributed by the New York Center for Agricultural Medicine and Health (NYCAMH) to Northeastern high school agriculture educators over the past six years. It was intended to supplement and stimulate the teaching of safety principles in agricultural education classes and thus enhance the awareness the knowledge of young people working on farms. This paper describes an evaluation of SAGE’s success at achieving these goals. Postal surveys from 20 teachers who had not previously received SAGE gathered data on class demographics and the amount of class time devoted to a variety of agricultural optics including tractor operation an agricultural health and safety. Teachers were asked to assess their student’s awareness of safety and health issues and also to estimate the number of students working in the farm environment. Following a year of SAGE mailings, the same information was gathered from the 24/29 post-SAGE responders. Comparison of pre-post responses from the 24 matched responding educators showed: limited increase in the teachers’ knowledge of basic agricultural safety information; a decline in the amount of class time devoted to health and safety; a marginal increase in estimated student awareness of health and safety and very little evidence of teacher awareness of SAGE as a safety resource. Most notable was the fact that only 8% of all students were currently working on a farm and teacher estimated that only 6% would be working on farms in five years.
Date Published: 2005
Safety for Agricultural Educators (SAGE) is a two-sided fact sheet on agricultural hazards that has been distributed by the New York Center for Agricultural Medicine and Health (NYCAMH) to Northeastern high school agriculture educators over the past six years. It was intended to supplement and stimulate the teaching of safety principles in agricultural education classes and thus enhance the awareness the knowledge of young people working on farms. This paper describes an evaluation of SAGE’s success at achieving these goals. Postal surveys from 20 teachers who had not previously received SAGE gathered data on class demographics and the amount of class time devoted to a variety of agricultural optics including tractor operation an agricultural health and safety. Teachers were asked to assess their student’s awareness of safety and health issues and also to estimate the number of students working in the farm environment. Following a year of SAGE mailings, the same information was gathered from the 24/29 post-SAGE responders. Comparison of pre-post responses from the 24 matched responding educators showed: limited increase in the teachers’ knowledge of basic agricultural safety information; a decline in the amount of class time devoted to health and safety; a marginal increase in estimated student awareness of health and safety and very little evidence of teacher awareness of SAGE as a safety resource. Most notable was the fact that only 8% of all students were currently working on a farm and teacher estimated that only 6% would be working on farms in five years.
