Five Star Safety - School Safety

Follow Our School Safety Tips

There are many aspects to ensuring proper school safety for our children. This measures vary depending on the age of the children that are in attendance as well as what part of the country one lives in. But, on this page we will concentrate on the playgrounds that are at every school up to high school - high school safety will be covered on subsequent pages.

Here we need to focus on the elementary school safety issue of the playground, where thousands of children are injured each year.

Keeping the playground safe

The playground is a common place for injury, but there are some measures that should be in place there to provide overall child safety. Take the time as a parent or caregiver to double check your child's playground, it could save your child from an avoidable injury. Here are a few things to look out for when making sure the playground is up to par with school safety standards:

All playground should have their surfaces covered with a soft material that makes impact less threatening. Materials such as wood-chips should be at least a foot thick, or they should be covered with the new rubber surfaces that we already see in many places.
Check to see how many people they have supervising the children at all times when they are present on the playground and voice your concern to the principal if you feel as though it is inadequate supervision.
Check that the ground of the playground extends out far enough so that no matter what a child falls from, including the swings, they will be protected by the soft "floor". This is basic school safety.
Look over the playground for anything that sticks out and could snag or pierce someone.
The edges of all of the equipment should be smooth and not sharp, report any edges that could easily cut a child.
There should be guardrails surrounding any elevated play area to prevent falls.
Gaps in the equipment should either be less than 3 inches or more than 9, in order to prevent the children from getting stuck in between. This doesn't really concern hazing, but that's still an important topic to keep in mind.

Summing up school safety

These are just a few of the things to look out for, and not just for school safety, but for playground safety in general. Even if your child is not yet of school age, they may have similar equipment at their pre-school and that too should be assessed for proper preschool safety. There are enough children that do get hurt on the playground every year to make this a concern. Take it upon yourself and make sure that they grow up to be safe teens as well!