Chemical safety management for K-12 schools, from the first walk-through to the yearly plan
The Chemical Safety Management Certificate for K-12 Schools is an online course for superintendents, principals, district leaders, and facilities and business officials. It teaches chemical safety management at the district level: who is responsible, what to buy and refuse, how to count what you have, how to remove what you should not have, and how to keep it from coming back. It turns the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Toolkit for Safe Chemical Management in K-12 Schools into a program your district can run today.
Chemicals in a school are not only in the science lab. The course covers custodial and maintenance products, art and trade-shop supplies, the nurse’s office, pesticides on the grounds, and hazards built into older buildings such as mercury, lead, PCBs and asbestos.
What you will learn
- Leadership, the Law and the Team: who runs the program, which federal and state rules reach your schools, and the partners who help.
- Find Out Where You Stand: where chemicals hide in a school, a safe walk-through, a full self-evaluation and goals you can measure.
- Design the Program: a first-year plan, the real cost of a chemical, and where the money comes from.
- The District Chemical Management Plan: the board policy, how it fits with the Chemical Hygiene Plan and hazard communication, and approved and prohibited chemical lists.
- Purchasing and Donations: one door in for every chemical, donations and products from home, and safer substitutes.
- A Safe District Inventory: planning the count so nobody is hurt, what it records, and years of supply.
- The Cleanout: the disposal list, your hazardous waste category, the one-cleanout-a-year rule, and hiring a qualified vendor.
- Hazards Across the Campus: mercury, lead and PCBs, asbestos, treated playground wood, radioactive sources, cleaning products and pesticides.
- Training, Communication and Emergencies: training by audience, the fire department and parents, and the spill response plan.
- Keeping the Program Going: the yearly cycle and the report to the board.
Earn your certificate and build your program binder
Each module ends with a Task, and each Task fills in a fillable template: a team charter, a walk-through and self-evaluation, a first-year plan and budget, a board policy and chemical lists, purchase screening and donation forms, an inventory plan, a disposal list and vendor scorecard, a special hazards register, a training and communication plan, and an annual calendar. Finish the ten modules and their quizzes to earn the Science Safety certificate.
Why this course
- Brought up to current rules: EPA’s school documents date from 2006 to 2008. This course teaches the same program with today’s rules, including EPA’s very small quantity generator category, the one-cleanout-a-year episodic event rule (40 CFR 262.231 and 262.232), the current OSHA State Plans, and the lead-in-school-water sampling rule (40 CFR 141.92).
- Written for decision-makers: every teaching lesson shows the step in a small district and in a large one.
- Hands-on lessons included: four lessons from the Chemical Hygiene Officer series on storage, inventory, safety data sheets and waste are built in.
- Online and self-paced: work through it on your own schedule.
A Science Safety course based on public federal guidance. It is not an EPA product and is not endorsed by EPA.
