Caithness and Inverness pupils to get Road Safety tips

Almost three hundred primary 6 and 7 pupils from primary schools in Caithness and Inverness will gather this week to be trained in new roles as Junior Road Safety Officers for their schools.

Cllr Allan Henderson, Chair of Highland Council's Environment, Development and Infrastructure Committee said: “Saving lives is what these two very important training days are all about. The training provided helps senior pupils to deliver the important role of Junior Road Safety Officer in their areas. It empowers them to share road safety education information to their fellow pupils; encourages them to adopt sustainable travel choices and fosters a safe and healthy highland school population.”

Training days are being organised by The Highland Council’s Road Safety Team on Tuesday 15 May from 10:30 to 1:30pm at the Pulteney Centre in Wick and on Wednesday 16 May from 10am to 2pm at Eden Court, Inverness.

The Junior Road Safety Officer (JRSO) programme in Scotland puts children in control of highlighting road safety issues within their own school. A particularly empowering programme, it gives senior primary pupils the opportunity to become JRSOs for a year. Their tasks are:

• to organise a road safety noticeboard,
• deliver safety presentations to classes or assemblies an
• run school road safety competitions.

At the training days the new JRSO’s will be provided information from a number of organisations (in addition to Highland Council) to help them undertake their roles within their schools including: Scottish Fire and Rescue Service; Road Safety Scotland; Breedons; Sustrans and HITRANS; Living Streets; Police Scotland and Cycling Scotland.

At the Wick event, 59 Junior Road Safety Officers will be attending the training representing 13 schools; and at the Inverness event 236 Junior Road Safety Officers will take part for 57 schools.

The core resource for the Junior Road Safety Officer programme is its website www.jrso.com, which includes a ‘members only' area specifically for JRSOs.

Strathgarve Primary with Stewart Geddes, Scottish Fire and Rescue and Lisa MacKellaich Highland Council Road Safety Officer