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also submit school safety topics to the school paper, to the local newspaper, and to the local safety councils. Other committees should be appointed as the need arises.

Safety courts. An effective system of enforcing safety in some mines and mining committees is the safety court; men accused of violating safety rules are brought before the court and tried; this provides amusement and at the same time is effective in enforcing rules. A similar plan has proved successful in schools where the children are old enough to understand the full significance of the court.

A list of regulations to be enforced at the school should be posted in a conspicuous place in the school building. If anyone is reported breaking the rule, he or she should be brought up for trial.

A judge, a district attorney, and a court clerk, generally members of the upper classes, are appointed by the officers of the junior safety council and the principal. The student-faculty committee might appoint these officers. The executive committee generally acts as the jury.

In a handbook entitled "The Junior Safety Council" the National Safety Council makes the following suggestions:

Court is convened once a month or oftener if desired. Any pupil who sees another pupil committing an offense against the regulations must report the offender to his class representative. Once a week the class representatives hand their reports to the clerk of the court, who enters the offender's name in his book. On the day of the meeting of the court, subpenas are served on these offenders.

The judge calls for the calendar, and the court comes to order. The clerk reads the cases. If the offender has a witness, he is permitted to testify. This gives the district attorney an opportunity to detect any false statements and also to discourage petty taletelling. The jury submits its decision based on the evidence given.

The types of cases tried by the court may be hitching, jaywalking, smoking, fighting, and throwing stones. The penalties may be suspension from the council; probation, the offender being required to report to his or her class representative at stated intervals; deprivation of school playground privileges, school moving pictures; or confiscation of toys and other articles such as roller skates, bicycles, knives, slingshots, etc., which have been misused. If the offense is a minor one, the child is sometimes not called to court but sent to his teacher for a reprimand. Serious offenses are referred to the principal and, if the child is a persistent repeater, a council representative or visiting teacher may be asked to call at his home. In case of willful infringement of the safety law, a member of the junior safety council may be suspended and his insignia taken away.

SAFETY-DISCUSSION CONTEST

During the first 6 months of 1932 the Lake Superior Mining Section, National Safety Council, conducted a safety-discussion contest in the junior high schools of the mining towns and villages of Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.

The purpose of this contest was to establish greater safety for the child at home, school, work, and play through a wider dissemination of safety knowledge among school children, teachers, and parents and through the creation of greater interest in and greater regard for this safety knowledge.

All children up to 17 years of age and not above the ninth grade were eligible. The principal mining ranges included were the Cuy

una, Gogebic, Marquette, Menominee, Mesabi, and Vermillion and the copper country of Michigan.

The contest called for the writing and oral delivery of a short talk, not to exceed 450 words, on any safety topic in general but relating particularly to school children.

The actual writing of the speech was preceded by a program of school preparation, which included the teacher's presentation and explanation of the contest and the reading of recommended articles by the children.

The representative of each school district sent a copy of his or her speech to the chairman of the Lake Superior Mining Section, National Safety Council, Hibbing, Minn.; a board of three judges selected by the organization chose the best speeches, and at its June meeting at Duluth the writers of the two speeches finally selected presented their talks.

Prizes, all suitably inscribed, were a gold-rimmed button for each school classroom, a bronze medal for each school district, and a gold medal for each major division. The school district of each winner of the two major divisions received a plaque or loving cup for its permanent possession.

CONCLUSION

Safety education in schools in mining districts is decidedly valuable to miners and mining companies in reducing and preventing mine accidents. The effect often is immediate, as the children take home safety literature, which may be read with profit by men who work in the mines.

While in school, children assimilate safety thoughts and practices. It has often been stated that at least 75 percent of all accidents may be prevented; with some 12 years of safety training behind him, a young man starting to work in mines is likely to become a safe worker, and the mining industry will reap the benefit of much of the safety education in schools.

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After this publication has served your purpose and if you have no further need for it, please return it to the Bureau of Mines. The use of this mailing label to do so will be official business, and no postage stamps will be required

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