Protecting Young Workers: What Teachers and Counselors Can Do
Teach about teen worker rights and responsibilities.
Teach health and safety in your classes.
Various curricula have been developed to educate teens about workplace
safety and health in work experience, workability, school-to-career and
life skills classes, as well as in academic classes such as U.S.
Government, English or Science classes. Oregon has a Youth @ Work: Talking Safety
curriculum that is free and downloadable. There are workshops around
the state of Oregon to introduce this curriculum to you. To get more
information please contact info@oregonyoungworkers.org. Post Safe Jobs for Youth Poster in your classroom. Have a poster contest in your class and post your own posters. Distribute fact sheets to teens.
Key labor laws and health and safety laws can help protect teens and
short, easy-to-read fact sheets can summarize these for a teen. See
these examples: Are you a working teen? (English) and ?Eres un joven que trabaja? (Spanish). To request or download materials such as posters, fact sheets, bookmarks, etc. visit the National Young Worker Health and Safety Resource Center’s website.
Be aware of the laws that can protect teens from being injured on the job.
Oregon’s Child Labor Laws prohibit teens from working late and/or long hours, and from doing especially dangerous work. (http://www.oregon.gov/BOLI/WHD/CLU/docs/wh218.pdf) OR-OSHA's workplace safety and health regulationsrequire that the workplace be safe, and that workers receive health and safety training on the tasks they do. (http://www.orosha.org )
Help teens with problems at work.
If a teen has concerns about hours or safety at work, help him or
her think about what changes are needed and why, whose help might be
needed, and how to approach the supervisor. For health and safety information and advice, call the National Young Worker Safety Resource Center. Many materials are available in Spanish. (510) 643-2424 If necessary, contact one of these agencies.
To make a health or safety complaint: Oregon OSHA (800) 922-2689 http://www.orosha.org
To make a complaint about sexual harassment or discrimination: Oregon Civil Rights Division (503) 731-4874 http://www.oregon.gov/BOLI/CRD US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (800) 669-4000 http://www.youth.eeoc.gov
For information about benefits for injured workers: Oregon Workers’ Compensation Division (800) 452-0288 http://www.cbs.state.or.us/wcd
