New Teen Safety Campaign Launched in Texas
Texas Mutual Insurance Company and several partner employers began a "One Wrong Move" teen worker safety campaign in Lubbock on Thursday. The campaign uses brochures, billboards, radio commercials, mall advertising, and the OneWrongMove.org Web site to educate teens, parents, and employers in the Lubbock area about workplace hazards and how to prevent them. The theme of the campaign is "Workplace Accidents Are a Pain. Work Smart."
"With this campaign, Texas Mutual and its partners aim to educate people in the Lubbock area about how to avoid workplace accidents among 16- to 19-year-olds,” said Russell R. Oliver, president of Texas Mutual."“One wrong move in the workplace -- a restaurant or a retail store, for instance -- certainly can result in life-changing injuries for a teen worker."
The campaign is being tested in the Lubbock area with participation from Dairy Queen, a Texas institution and in an industry that frequently hires teen workers; the Lubbock Chamber of Commerce; Caprock Business Forms; Chicken Express; Children's Home of Lubbock; Crenshaw, Dupree & Milam, LLP; Fastbreak/Balco Electric; Greer Electric; Lubbock YWCA; Schlotzsky’s; South Plains Mall; and South Plains Service Electric. The kickoff event took place at a Dairy Queen restaurant.
Teens in the Lubbock area can win a free movie ticket to a Cinemark Theatres movie by completing an online workplace safety quiz at the campaign's Web site.
Texas Mutual said BLS statistics indicate there were 14 workplace deaths among 18- and 19-year-olds in the state in 2007 but no workplace deaths among 16- and 17-year-olds, while a national survey released in 2007 by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill indicates about one-third of teen workers don't receive safety training at work.