The University of Iowa

SAFETYmatters - Innovation in Safety Award Winners

Innovation in Safety Award Winner - Ben Anzelc

Ben Anzelc, Facilities and Safety Coordinator in the School of Art and Art History, was presented with the Innovation in Safety Award along with other award winners at the Hancher Stanley Café on October 20th, 2022. 

The School of Art and Art History is unique on campus because the nature of their coursework exposes students to hazards that are not typically found in other programs.  In order for their students to gain the “hands-on” experience needed, projects require them to work with a wide variety of tools and equipment that can be dangerous if not used properly including power saws, drill presses, kilns, and welding booths.  Ben Anzelc identified a gap in the program in needing to provide more equipment-specific training, and a need to be able to accurately track who has done that training and whether they are qualified to work on that equipment.  This is challenging due to the hundreds of students enrolled in the program and that students may be exposed to new equipment and hazards every semester.

Ben’s innovation to address this challenge was multifaceted.  It included developing safety specific content for individual online courses and partnering with IT to automatically enroll students into the needed course(s), track their completion progress, provide reports, and email them and their instructors with reminders, if necessary, to complete the training.  The other unique innovation is that this information can be tied to a student’s ID card.  If they scan in to use a particular classroom or studio and have not completed all the relevant training, then the instructor will not allow them to use the facility until their training is up to date.  Most importantly, the program produces the result of an extremely low injury occurrence not only for students, but for faculty and staff as well.

 

Innovation in Safety Award Winner - Emily Finzel

Emily Finzel, Associate Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, was presented with the Innovation in Safety Award along with other award winners at the Hancher Stanley Café on October 20th, 2022. 

The Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences understands the critical nature of having students participate in field-based training which exposes students to hazards that are inherently different than those found in a laboratory setting.  Dr. Finzel has led efforts both within the University of Iowa and nationally to develop best practices for field safety protocols, including addressing a gap in safety oversight for field-camp-like scenarios where individuals are spread out over a wide area day after day.

Dr. Finzel collaborated with several internal University departments including Risk Management and the Office of the General Counsel to draft a Pre-Activity Statement for each field trip.  The statement requires instructors to consider potential risks and mitigation strategies.  She also compiled a Field Safety Best Practices document to outline University and College of Liberal Arts and Sciences guidelines and forms required for planning field courses and field-based research.  On a national scale, Dr. Finzel created a field safety forum for instructors of summer field camps in an effort to improve the safety culture among field leaders.  She arranged for a National Outdoor Leadership School Wilderness First Aid course for individuals where Emergency Medical Service response could take approximately 8 hours, such as in field scenarios.  Most importantly, the field-safety forms, manuals and training information are easy to use, effective at identifying risks and mitigation strategies, and addressed a gap in safety oversight for faculty, staff, and students at the University and nation-wide.