Youth safety resources
To promote youth safety, we offer a toolkit including resources for young workers, parents, employers, and educators
Ohio's youth are the working adults of the future and keeping them safe at work is a priority for BWC. To promote youth safety, we want to partner with youth, parents, employers and educators to offer education and support for youth workers. The toolkit on this page helps us do that.
Young Workers Safety Online Training
The BWC Learning Center offers a free, interactive online safety training for young people entering into the workforce. Topics include rights and responsibilities as a worker, how to identify and navigate different types of hazards, use and care of personal protective equipment (PPE), and tips to help avoid injuries and illnesses in the workplace. Click here for instructions on How to Use the BWC Learning Center.
Websites
Young Worker Summer Job Safety
Sponsored by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), gives information on specific summer jobs for youth
Center for Young Worker Safety and Health
Located at the Georgia Tech Research Institute, offers all seven of their training programs online and free of charge for students, educators, employers and their families
Young Worker Safety and Health
Sponsored by the National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health (NIOSH), provides an abundance of information on youth safety, including facts for youth from hazard recognition to youth rights in the workplace. It includes teacher resources. It also provides information to employers specific to the youth worker and injury prevention in specific jobs such as agriculture, construction and fast food service.
Sponsored by WorkSafe BC, covers a variety of topics for the young worker, including a special spotlight video clip on a young worker. Includes resources for educators.
This Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety site is full of tips for young workers as well as a detailed listing of commonly held youth jobs with their hazards. It also provides information for parents and their roles in young worker safety as well as information for employers to provide guidance in health and safety.
National Young Worker Safety Resource Center
A collaborative project of U.C. Berkeley’s Labor Occupational Health Program and the Education Development Center, Inc. in Massachusetts
Health and Safety Awareness for Working Teens
Prepared by the University of Washington to help prevent young workers from being injured, harassed or killed on the job by providing them with information and educational resources. Includes teacher resources
Sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor provides links to rules pertaining to young workers including child labor provisions in the Fair Labor Standards Act and occupational safety and health rules, which also pertain to young workers
Publications/Articles
OSHA
Occupational Injuries Among Young Workers
Monthly Labor Review, Bureau of Labor Statistics
NIOSH
Can You Dig It? A Safety & Health Guide for Young Workers in Landscaping, Greenhouses & Nurseries
Federal Network for Young Worker Safety and Health
Information on youth rights and responsibilities in the workplace
The Ohio Division of Industrial Compliance offers this fact sheet with the Ohio laws pertaining to minors.
Sponsored by the US Department of Labor provides information to youth, educators and employers on compliance issues and other concerns of youth in the work force
Young Workers: You Have Rights!
Sponsored by OSHA, designed to help the youth worker stay healthy and safe on the job through links specific to youth concerns including stressful conditions, dangerous work, unsafe equipment, trying to hurry and inadequate supervision. Also provides information to educators.
Educational resources on restrictions involving hours of employment and nature of work
Youth Rules! Stickers & Bookmarks
Sponsored by the US Department of Labor, provides employers with youth safety stickers and bookmarks formatted for printing
Additional resources for educators
Safety Checklist Program for Schools
Sponsored by NIOSH, provides many valuable links for educators to assist with educating students in the importance of workplace safety as well as implementing their own safety and health programs through the NIOSH Safety Checklist Program for Schools
A foundation curriculum in occupational safety and health created by a consortium of partners, including NIOSH
Harriet Rubenstein – Protecting the Health and Safety of Working Teenagers – American Family Physician, Vol. 60/No.2/August 1999
Labor education for the K-12 curriculum
California Federation of Teachers, Labor and Climate Justice Education Committee
Additional resources for employers
NIOSH – Preventing deaths, injuries and illnesses of young workers
Protecting youth at work: health, safety and development of working children and adolescents in the US. National Academy Press, 1998 (BWC Library)