Signed Safety at Work

SSaW has produced a sign vocabulary (based on International Sign) of around 200 essential Health and Safety (H&S) words and phrases (in multilingual glossary and eLearning resource format), to facilitate workplace communication between all employees, whatever their hearing and language ability. The planned impact of the SSaW project - the improvement of employment opportunities and social inclusion for the deaf/hearing-impaired and migrant communities - was successfully gained. The project is creating opportunities for companies and organisations to enhance their workplace environment by keeping ahead of the increasing demand for high Health and Safety standards coming from employees, authorities and the public. As safety in the workplace is being increasingly discussed in the wake of the emergence of COVID-19, this trans-European project opens new ways of communicating Health and Safety messages so they are as effective and inclusive as possible. This objective was formulated around known needs, based on existing research policy, and is strongly aligned with Erasmus+ objectives and priorities. The European Framework Directive 89/391 on Safety and Health at Work is a milestone in improving safety and health at work, which guarantees minimum safety and health requirements throughout Europe. Employers are therefore strongly motivated to ensure their employees' health and safety in the workplace, and an easy way for all employees to communicate urgent messages, particularly in high-risk situations, helps to do this. It will also reduce employers' concerns about workplace communication issues, which should encourage an increase in the employment of D/deaf/HI people, and migrants, (acting on the horizontal priority of social inclusion). Furthermore, manufacturing and construction are the industries with the highest rates of industrial deafness cases, and so employers who do not have systems in place for D/deaf/HI employees are likely to lose more experienced workers whose hearing becomes impaired over time. The ability to retain older workers (an issue raised in the EC’s Strategic Framework on Health & Safety at Work 2014-2020) is an additional and longer term benefit of this project. The project has created 4 intellectual outputs: O1 - Sign vocabulary 200 Health and Safety words and phrases, created in English by experts in manufacturing, Health and Safety and sign language, then transferred into a signed form (based on International Sign wherever possible). O2 - Online glossaryGlossary with videos of all the sign vocabulary signs, with translation (and additional information where required) in English, British Sign Language, German, Austrian Sign Language, Italian and Italian Sign Language. The signs are available to view online for free on desktop, laptop, smartphone or tablet. O3 - E-learning resourceFreely available online eLearning resource containing 14 modules in three different languages, with scenario-based learning activities, taking International Sign videos from the online glossary in order to teach the sign vocabulary. O4 - Guidelines for diversity in health and safety Information on national Health and Safety qualifications, how the eLearning resource can be incorporated into VET providers' existing health and safety training courses, and information about how people with hearing impairment can specialise in a career in health and safety. Partners identified eight groups of people with which they worked to produce the SSaW resources outlined above and who they expect will most benefit from this innovative project: - Employees with hearing impairment - Migrant employees - Employees with no hearing or language issues (they will also need to use the sign vocabulary, if it is to become widespread) - Health and Safety experts and/or officers - Training Curricula developers - Human Resource policymakers - Social-inclusion activists - Health and Safety teachers The project's ultimate aim is increased access to employment for D/deaf/HI and migrant community. Around 5000 people have been reached directly and indirectly through project activities.The project has worked to include stakeholders from each of the groups covered by the project (D/deaf, foreign Deaf people, experts in the field of H&S) in all phases from glossary design to production and dissemination. This has ensured a real inclusion of possible stakeholders in the project as a whole.A further longer term benefit of SSaW is the real potential of the Glossary and E-learning resource to serve as a blueprint for a resource that can be extended or transferred across other sectors (to cover other national sign languages, other industries or to accommodate other forms of communication issues such as those caused by autism, Dyslexia or Down's Syndrome)