Conference paper
All about the teacher, the rain and the backpack: The lack of a systems approach to risk assessment in school outdoor education programs
Procedia Manufacturing, Vol.3, pp.1157-1164
Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics (AHFE) International Conference, 6th (Las Vegas, United States, 26-Jul-2015–30-Jul-2015)
Elsevier BV
2015
Abstract
Inadequate risk assessment has been highlighted as a contributing factor in the deaths of several children participating on school outdoor education programs. Further, whilst the systems thinking approach to accident prevention is now prevalent in this domain, the extent to which schools consider the overall led outdoor system during risk assessment processes is not clear. The aim of this study was to determine whether the systems thinking perspective has been translated into risk assessments for outdoor programs. Four school outdoor education risk assessments were analysed and Rasmussen's (1997) Risk Management framework was used to map the hazards and actors identified in the risk assessments. The results showed that the hazards and actors identified reside across the lower levels of the Accimap framework, suggesting a primary focus on the immediate context of the delivery of the activity. In short, from a systems perspective, not all of the potential hazards were identified and assessed. This suggests that current risk assessment practice is not consistent with contemporary models of accident causation, and further, key risks could currently be overlooked. The need for the development of a systems theory based risk assessment process is discussed.
Details
- Title
- All about the teacher, the rain and the backpack: The lack of a systems approach to risk assessment in school outdoor education programs
- Authors
- Clare Dallat (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts and BusinessPaul M Salmon (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts and BusinessNatassia Goode (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts and Business
- Publication details
- Procedia Manufacturing, Vol.3, pp.1157-1164
- Conference details
- Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics (AHFE) International Conference, 6th (Las Vegas, United States, 26-Jul-2015–30-Jul-2015)
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Date published
- 2015
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.promfg.2015.07.193
- ISSN
- 2351-9789
- ISBN
- 9781495160424
- Copyright note
- Copyright © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B. V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND licence (http://creativecommons.org/licences/by-nc-nd/4.0/)
- Organisation Unit
- Centre for Human Factors and Systems Science; School of Social Sciences - Legacy; University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland; School of Law and Society
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99449260402621
- Output Type
- Conference paper
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