Safety thinking as part of teaching

Guests can download the emergency plan to their mobile device from QR codes, which can be found on the notice boards in the premises, for example," Petri Rintala and Pertti Salo say.

When safe working is cultivated during the student years, a strong foundation for a safety culture has been created by the time a young person enters the workplace. In Keski-Pohjanmaa Education Group, both the management, staff and students are strongly committed to safety thinking.

The main campus of the Central Ostrobothnia Education Group is located in Kokkola, but the group also has offices in Terveysti, Perho, Kaustinen, Kälviye and Kannus. The current building mass is about 70 000 k-m2. It has a staff of just over 400 and a total student population of between 3 500 and 4 000.

Protect has played an important expert role in the education group's efforts to build a safe working and learning environment.

-"We make extensive use of the PRO24 system both as a management tool and as a tool to improve the safe performance of work," says Petri Rintala, Head of Real Estate, whose responsibilities include occupational health and safety issues at the educational group.

The Education Group was the first to use the PRO24 notification tool. Teachers and other staff can use their own IDs to make a notification with a picture, for example, of an accident or an anomaly they have observed. The matter is then handled in a pre-defined way.

Later, it has been extended to include risk assessment, for example, as well as electronic emergency plans for all properties.

-"The personal PRO24 safety desktop contains the fire and rescue plans for all sites, explosion protection documents for Atex premises, chemical lists, occupational health and safety desktop, work risk assessments, safety notices and designated meeting places for properties," says Rintala.

safety has also been improved by appointing a dedicated premises and safety officer for each building. Visitors have not been forgotten either. For example, on the noticeboard in the premises, QR codes are available for guests to download an emergency plan to their mobile device.

When entering the workplace, outsiders are identified while ensuring that they are wearing appropriate protective equipment. In this way, students learn practices that are now part of industry safety protocol.

Public safety has been improved by the installation of surveillance cameras, mainly in public areas.

In developing safety, Rintala emphasises the usefulness of new technologies.

-In the recently completed learning environment at Metal, we have Dali-controlled lighting to communicate, for example, in case of an emergency, as alarm sounds cannot always be heard through the noise from the machinery. Thanks to the new solutions, we now have several different channels to communicate.

According to him, a safety culture requires commitment, long-term development and putting things into practice in many different ways.

-Working with Protect, we have achieved a good level of safety, so we can take things forward in a balanced way, component by component. We have looked for solutions to prevent accidents as effectively as possible in a situation where the people involved, the students, are still relatively inexperienced. In addition, the focus on safety in the working and learning environment is an attraction because it sends out a message of responsibility," says Rintala.