DOL Seeks Ideas to Improve Outreach to Teens on Workplace Safety

The U.S. Department of Labor is encouraging teens, parents, employers, and others to join a national online dialogue intended to collect ideas for reaching teens with information about workplace protections. The dialogue is being co-hosted by OSHA and other agencies. DOL intends to use ideas it gathers to improve efforts to inform teens about workplace hazards, the types of work they are allowed to do, employment training, workplace discrimination, and related topics. Employers are encouraged to share ideas for information, tools, and resources that would help them convey workplace rules and safety procedures to teens as well as any best practices for protecting teens in the workplace. The department hopes that teens and teen workers will share how they would like to receive information about workplace protections and whom they trust as sources for this information.

The virtual discussion will continue until Friday, April 30. Visit the dialogue home page to submit an idea or review ideas that have already been submitted.

Related: AIHA and NIOSH jointly present the Safety Matters program, which is intended to raise awareness among young workers about workplace safety and health. A column published in the December 2019 Synergist describes how the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment Occupational Health program, along with the AIHA Rocky Mountain Section and the Colorado Chapter of the American Society of Safety Professionals, used Safety Matters to teach health and safety to young workers in grades 7 through 12.