Almost thirty primary school students were ‘appointed’ as Junior Road Safety Officers by South Dublin County Council as part of a new road safety programme for primary schools in South Dublin. The ‘Junior Road Safety Officers’ (JRSO) initiative was launched by the Mayor of South Dublin Cllr Paul Gogarty and the council’s Road Safety Officer Declan Keogh, in partnership with the Road Safety Authority and the Primary Schools network.
This is the first JRSO programme undertaken by the council which provides the JRSO’s with three months of assignments and tasks to do before they finish for their school holidays in June. Their final task is to nominate and appoint two new JRSO’s for the next full school term in September.
Each participating school has two JRSO’s whose job is to help promote road safety education and awareness among their class mates, family and friends Speaking at the launch this morning, Mayor Paul Gogarty said “As we all know, road safety is a very important topic and it involves each and every one of us as citizens and as a road user. The job of the Junior Road Safety Officers is to help promote road safety within their school, and among class mates, friends and family and any activity that can help these measures is welcomed.”
The students received their Junior Road Safety Officer packs which included a JRSO book with monthly plans, ideas and actions to promote road safety. There are also competitions and games within the book such as road safety crosswords, puzzles and learning the Safe Cross Code.
The first assignment which the JRSO’s have to do is promote the ‘Be Safe Be Seen’ campaign whereby people must be responsible and visible while using the road. As part of the launch, two JRSO’s from Scoil Ide in Clondalkin featured on a video promoting the campaign.
6th class students Codie Ryan and Rosie Armstrong helped the Road Safety Officer record a video with their class on the importance of being visible and safe while on the roads.
South Dublin’s Road Safety Officer Declan Keogh said the newly ‘appointed’ officers will provide great assistance in terms of helping to promote road safety. “We’re always looking at new ways to promote road safety and this new initiative, the Junior Road Safety Officers is a not only a great thing for the JRSO’s themselves, but to the entire school, their local communities and other road users too because the work that they will do within their class and school will also be brought outside and into the public, so they too are helping to raise the profile of road safety and hopefully, helping to reduce the number of road related incidents.”
Any primary schools wishing to be added to the JRSO programme can contact South Dublin County Council’s Road Safety Unit on 01-4149207 or email roadsafe@sdublincoco.ie and typing JRSO in the subject bar.
Image Credit; Ben Ryan Photography
Main Image; Divine Word School, Rathfarnham. L to R: (Teacher Mairead Larkin, RSAs Orliath Maguire, JRSOs Zara Reilly and Oscar Moran and Mayor Paul Gogarty)
