A sticky situation

Anastasia De Waal, 19 June 2009

“Health and safety gone mad!” is a cry oft uttered by grumpy ranters; harking back to the good old days, they remember when children boldly scaled the lofty heights of the school oak tree, experimented with explosive chemicals in the lab, and roamed forests without any sign of parental permission slips and supplementary adult protection.

A new survey, conducted by Teachers TV, set out to test whether or not the world really has gone health and safety mad.  The verdict from teachers: it has.

Almost half (46.5%) of those teachers surveyed claim excessive health and safety regulations have restricted pupils’ personal growth; while 44.3% believe that the regulations have had an adverse impact on pupils’ education.  Teachers also complain that such overzealous policies have made their jobs more difficult.

The survey revealed some glorious examples, swiftly seized upon by anti-health and safety campaigners as fodder for their cause. It is indeed a little difficult to take seriously the claim by one teacher that at their school pupils must don protective goggles before using Blu-Tack; or the five-page briefing that is essential reading regarding the perils of improper use of Pritt Stick.

While these are the extreme examples, many of the rules cited seem to exhibit an undue caution, a protectiveness that veers towards the ludicrous.  It is of course imperative that children’s welfare is prioritised, but the limitations of this approach must also be considered.  A school that cancels PE due to wet grass may avoid a child slipping over and grazing its knee; but this is a rainy country, and a spate of such events could lead to a class of sedentary children whose lack of exercise then endangers their health.  On a more cerebral level, consider the stifling effect such regulations must have on teachers’ imaginations: innovative and exciting lessons are ‘too dangerous’ or at best incur reams of paperwork.

Invariably, over-regulation stifles creativity, but for now at least, it looks like regulation’s here to stay.  What’s a teacher seeking to inspire to do?  Well happier news can be found in this week’s Times Educational Supplement. Reports on several innovative projects around the country prove that in some classrooms, creativity is very much alive and well.  In High Wycombe, for example, pupils at Chepping View Primary have just won a national schools radio award for their podcasts, developed over the past year.  Chepping View teachers chose “pupils who were lively and energetic but reluctant writers”, and channelled their natural gregariousness into engaging them in something which develops their writing skills.  In Bristol, excluded pupils at the Whitehouse Centre pupil referral unit have won this year’s ‘Sharp Shotz’ animation contest, as part of a competition to stop knife crime, drug and alcohol abuse.  Beating their better-resourced peers at other mainstream schools has given them the confidence and skills to leave the pupil referral unit and their short story will now be made into an animation, sent out to all secondary schools in the South West.

Until we can come up with a way to ensure pupil safety without obscuring creative stimulus, let’s hope teachers can be inspired by examples like these – instead of being stifled by rampant regulation.

By Helen Cowen