Safety training on warehouse worker hazards for structural steel latino Workers: Phase 2 implementation and assessment

Abstract

Structural steel workers are at an increased risk of work related injuries due to the nature of their work. Past research has shown that increasing awareness of warehouse hazards through formal training reduces the risk of workers being involved in accidents that may lead to injuries or fatalities. Latino workers are particularly exposed to workplace hazards because the safety training that they receive is often not delivered in a language and manner that they can understand. In order to address the barriers to adequate training for Latino workers, the research team successfully obtained a training grant from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to develop an English and Spanish Warehouse Worker training curricula for use with worker training. The first phase of the project included developing the safety training curriculum which consists of six contact hour worker training that covers potential hazard exposures that result from warehousing and processing tasks. The second phase of the project included administering the training to structural steel workers and assessing the training. The objective of this paper is to assess the Spanish version of the training which includes analyzing the demographic characteristics of participants, the knowledge gained and their perceptions about the quality and usefulness of the training in their workplace. In order to meet the objective, a demographic survey and a knowledge pre-test were administered prior to the training. A knowledge post-test and an exit survey were administered after participants completed the training. The training was completed by 104 structural steel workers in the metropolitan area of San Juan, Puerto Rico in summer 2015. The results from the demographic survey indicate that 99% of participants were male and 42.2% of participants had less than 5 years working in the structural steel industry. The results from the knowledge pre-test and posttest indicate that while the training significantly increased participants' knowledge about common warehouse hazards (average pre-test score 41.3%; average post-text score 55.2%), the scores are still low. This is a common challenge when training Latino workers that needs to be addressed. The results from the exit survey indicate that 97.9% of participants believe that the training was good or excellent, 100% of participants believe that the information was timely and of interest and 94.8% of participants believe that they will use the information presented in the training in their work. Strategies to improve the training program with an emphasis on increasing participant learning and exploring multiple forms of learning assessment in addition to written tests, such as performance-based assessments and participant oral presentations, are discussed. As the total number of Latino worker in the United States continues to trend upwards, the need for students in Construction Engineering and Management programs to understand the demographic characteristics of the Latino workforce and attributes that make training programs effective and culturally appropriate for Latino workers is also increasing. This paper contributes to the body of knowledge by highlighting the results of a training program tailored to Latino structural steel workers and discussing non-traditional assessments to measure knowledge gained by participants who typically not perform well in written tests.