Information Bulletin
22 June 2006
Junior Road Safety Officers
In an average year, 3000 children are injured on Scotland’s roads, of that around 1700 are pedestrians*. To help combat this and to highlight these issues, Road Safety Scotland developed a scheme in 2003 for schools to highlight local road safety issues. Each school is encouraged to appoint 2-4 JRSO’s from Primary 6 or 7 for a one-year period. Their main responsibilities are putting up and maintaining a prominent notice board, running school competitions, giving class or assembly presentations and using their website www.jrso.com.
The local Road Safety Officer (RSO) visits at the start of each year to give the new JRSO’s their packs and give them an induction into the scheme. The RSO also visits regularly throughout the year giving help and advice, as well as any resources that they may need.
The aim of the Junior Road Safety Officer (JRSO) scheme is to empower children to highlight road safety issues at their school. It also links to Citizenship by giving pupils the opportunities to develop as a whole person, by increasing their knowledge and understanding of topical issues.
In Shetland we have 13 primary schools that have set up this scheme within their school, giving us 32 JRSO’s across Shetland.
The JRSO’s have an adult helper within the school and together they set up and maintain the notice board. They highlight seasonal road safety issues as well as local road safety concerns that they are aware of around their school or out in their community.
To thank them for all their hard work for the last year, the Road Safety section of the Shetland Islands Council held a Presentation day in the Town Hall.
The photograph shows the JRSO’s following the presentation of their certificates and bags by Councillor Alistair Inkster, Chair of the Road Safety Advisory Panel.
ENDS
* Taken from Educational Information Booklet in JRSO Scheme.
From Elaine Skinley, Road Safety Officer, SIC, Safety & Risk. Tel: 744560