May 29, 2006—Teen workers are the focus of a new campaign launched recently by Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health Ed Foulke.
“Summer is peak time for teen employment,” said Foulke, who was sworn in April 3 as the new Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) assistant secretary. “We’re launching this safety campaign now to help educate teens on workplace dangers and offer solid safety tips that will help them stay safe and healthy on the job.”
The Teen Summer Job Safety Campaign, sponsored by OSHA, is a multi-year project to increase awareness about workplace hazards, and provide possible solutions to those hazards, for young workers and their parents. The campaign will focus on industries in which young people are likely to work during their high school and college years. The first year will target the landscaping industry.
The kick-off event also highlighted the Department of Labor’s YouthRules! Initiative to bring teens, parents, educators, employers, government, unions and advocacy groups together to ensure young workers have safe and rewarding work experiences.
The safety campaign stems from OSHA’s ongoing efforts to design new ways to raise job safety and health awareness among teens. This year’s campaign theme is “Landscaping — Plant Your Feet on Safe Ground.” OSHA developed a resource kit, or “tool box,” designed to help prevent injuries on the job in landscaping. The kit includes materials from OSHA, the Wage and Hour Division, the Environmental Protection Agency and other organizations on potential industry hazards, including machinery, sun and heat, and pesticides, and ways to avoid them.
The kit can be downloaded from OSHA’s Teen Workers Web page.
