Safety training puts a feather in their caps
Chemical hazard response course arms members with new knowledge, skills

You can’t be expert in everything, which is why science lab coordinator Nicole Lott is so grateful for the training her union provided in chemical hazard response.

As a member of the Oregon School Employees Association (OSEA), an independent statewide union of paraprofessionals and school-related personnel, Lott took the invitation to enroll in a chemical training course jointly sponsored by AFT PSRP and OSEA for one week in Portland last November.

“It’s a pretty extensive course, and I loved it,” she says, from learning what exposures can make you sick to what kinds of respirators to wear. The five workdays included hazardous waste training, electrical standards, chemical coding and OSHA certification.

As part of her job, Lott trains staff who use 700 chemicals, plus cleaning products, at the two campuses of Rogue Community College in Medford, Ore.

The training pays off for her every day. It helped Lott explain why staff need to wear certain kinds of protection. Bottles of hazardous chemicals are labeled, she notes, but you have to know what the labels mean and what happens if you mix them. “Everything is a chemical, even household items like bleach and ammonia,” she says. Now she feels prepared to handle them safely.

Same goes for Buckley Plummer, a member of the maintenance and grounds crew and a driver trainer for the Ontario (Ore.) School District 8C, who used the training to carry out chemical abatement and several OSHA compliances. He redesigned the chemistry lab, got rid of unused chemicals, and created a weekly safety checklist to make sure the eye washes and drench work right.

“There’s a lot of things that came out of it,” says Plummer, a 10-year OSEA member who considers the training a definite benefit of union membership. He praised the course, conducted jointly by the AFT, the Chemical Workers Union and other unions.

The training also got union members thinking about what to do in case of a bombing, a fire, a hostage situation or an earthquake. Plummer says it inspired him to move faster in setting up an early intervention program with his local fire department. In the event of a fire in a school, he’s now trained in how to don a mask properly during the response time and make sure the building is clear.

Lott got the most out of case studies from disasters, “learning from those mistakes.” She uses the lessons in her yearly safety training.

Herschel Phillips, head custodian at Widen Elementary School in Austin, Texas, attended the same course earlier last year. “I got quite a bit out of it,” says Phillips, a member of Education Austin, an AFT affiliate. “At first I thought it wasn’t for me, but as the training went on, I realized a lot of things I needed to know. It made me more aware of the chemicals we’re around every day.”

Afterwards, he handed out materials and talked with his crew about chemical reactions and the importance of reading labels. They also discussed how to handle emergencies.

Sharing what you’ve learned is essential, notes Darryl Alexander, the AFT’s director of health and safety: “Our members who participate in this training leave with a strong set of skills that will ultimately prevent dangerous chemical exposures for everyone: kids and staff.”

Lott agrees. “Everything we learn gets applied,” she says. “The more I learn, the more I share.”