Better Safe than Sorry
The College of Medicine’s safety initiative, Think Safety!, focuses on making safety a top priority for everyone in the Einstein community. The initiative, which was introduced five years ago, aims to create awareness and to promote creativity and teamwork in addressing safety around Einstein’s Jack and Pearl Resnick campus.
Rich Resto and John Schmidt, members of the receiving department, demonstrate safety practices when lifting heavy objects
Toward its goal of fostering safe practices, the initiative’s Think Safety! website highlights helpful information aimed at promoting good safety practices. Safety encompasses highlighting procedures at work to prevent injury, raising awareness of issues that can arise and how to respond in a safe manner, and encouraging proactive action by members of the Einstein community who may observe a safety risk on campus. For this reason, the program website includes a dedicated e-mail address —thinksafety@einstein.yu.edu— through which any member of the Einstein community can report safety problems and concerns, or suggest safety improvements.
To support its objective to promote safety by members of the Einstein community, each year the program recognizes Einstein employees who are making the campus a safer place. Awards are presented to departments, laboratories and individuals who exemplify noteworthy safety practices. These selections are made through nominations that are submitted to thinksafety@einstein.yu.edu (department award), inspection results obtained by the department of environmental health and safety (lab safety award), and the selection of an individual from all nominees recommended throughout the year (annual safety award). The latter award is chosen by Einstein’s Administrative Safety Committee and recognizes the most outstanding contribution to safety on campus.
This year’s recipients will be recognized at the Staff Service Recognition Ceremony, on Thursday, December 7. They include Edward Abbate, in engineering (annual safety award); Melissa Lopez-Jones, in the lab of Dr. Robert Singer and Dr. Kartik Chandran and his laboratory team (lab safety award); and Deborah Harris and Nicole Yerbanga, in security, and Cesar Neyra, in housekeeping (department award). You can view all award recipients since inception of the awards in 2012 on the Think Safety awards page.
To learn more about the program and how you can participate in Think Safety!, visit the program website. Do you know an individual, department or lab whose safety practices are exemplary? Nominate them to be recognized at the 2018 Service Awards.
Posted on: Wednesday, December 06, 2017