American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2001. 24 pp.
$2.50; complimentary single copies for teachers.

When you become a chemistry educator, there is much more to this career than lesson plans, preparing experiments, and evaluating students. You will be responsible for the safety of your students in a learning environment that carries a degree of risk. You will be responsible for an inventory of materials that can be, under the right circumstances, hazardous or even dangerous. You will be responsible for the care of the environment, in the correct handling and disposal of these materials. Finally, you are responsible for your own safety and health, and the conditions in which you and your colleagues are working. This is a tremendous burden, one that no teacher should face alone, and one that no teacher, administrator, department chair, or school board member should take lightly.

ACS has published a manual that attempts to introduce this issue to teachers and administrators, titled Chemical Safety for Teachers and Their Supervisors. For a school that is beginning to address the issue of safety in chemistry classrooms, it provides a common starting point for all persons responsible for the safe storage and handling of chemicals in a high school setting. This manual is divided into four sections, covering Use and Handling of Hazardous Chemicals, Teaching Safety, Preparing Safety Checklists, and Additional Resources. The goal of the authors is to help teachers prevent accidents by emphasizing safety in the chemistry laboratory. The format of the manual makes it seem at first glance to be outdated; its modest graphics and black-and-white photography are rather old-fashioned in our current world of slick, colorful publications. There is nothing old-fashioned about the contents, however. The information in the manual is current and in line with what is being produced elsewhere.

In the first section, the different chemical hazards are discussed, along with instructions for reading chemical labels and Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS), what risks there are for students and teachers, and how those risks are minimized with proper safety procedures and laboratory hygiene. Storage for various types of hazardous materials is also discussed, though not in much detail. However, the manual does mention that chemical supplier codes are used for storage arrangements and that these codes may differ from one supplier to the next, and it is important to familiarize oneself with storage requirements based on characteristics and compatibility.

The second section addresses the question of whether it is wise to involve students in risky procedures in the laboratory. The attitude of the authors is that students should be taught to handle materials correctly and how to safeguard themselves and others from harm. Having students participate in developing safety expectations is part of their overall education in chemistry. Students who are involved in developing these rules will more likely "buy in" to their necessity. It is important, however, that the ultimate responsibility for safety rest with the teacher.

A simple guideline for developing a safety checklist is included in the third section of the manual. In this checklist, any teacher can begin to evaluate his or her own practices, facilities, and storage. The example list in the manual was adapted from the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission's 1984 publication on lab safety titled School Science Laboratories: A Guide to Some Hazardous Substances. It is a good starting point for any school that does not yet use a safety checklist, and it can be modified or expanded to fit any school environment.

The last, and perhaps the most important section, has a list of more in-depth references that teachers can use to build their own knowledge. The manual is a good start and gives an excellent overview for nonteaching administrators or supervisors; but the teachers directly responsible for the care and safety of chemistry students, laboratory, and inventory should learn as much as they can about the proper storage, handling, and disposal of hazardous materials and the safety and liability issues in their state and county. This becomes much more critical if the teacher has inherited a laboratory stockroom that contains materials that are not needed, outdated, improperly stored, or no longer permitted in a high school setting. Preventing accidents is the goal of all chemistry teachers, and they need all the education, information, and support from their supervisors they can gather. If your school does not yet have a safety plan for the chemistry laboratory, start with Chemical Safety for Teachers and Their Supervisors and learn as much as you can about this very important aspect of your profession.

This publication is available from the American Chemical Society. Contact ACS as follows:

ACS Office of Society Services
1155 16th St., NW, Washington, DC 20036

Telephone: 800/227-5558

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