I completed my Safety and Health Representative course at Trainwest, a private RTO in Belmont, Western Australia. This five day introductory course gets me started as a workplace Safety and Health Representative, even though I had been acting in the role for around six months at this stage.

The first session of the first day was pretty much all about the Act and the Regulations, importantly, the questions in the trainee workbook allowed us to navigate these two important documents. This is an integral and important aspect of the course. The legalities and the ramifications are absolutely necessary.

The second session involved risk identification and control measures. We were required to create our own workplace checklists then undertake an inspection of their facilities. I appreciate the purpose of this activity to get us involved in an inspection instead of a passive listening process. I developed my checklist with the real intention of developing a specific engineering workshop checklist that I will incorporate in my workplace instead of the generic checklist they currently utilise.

The facilitator was a Director of the company, I had dealt with him before with my Certificate IV in Training and Assessment upgrade, so I have already had contact with him. He was in quarantine as his kid caught covid at school, so he facilitated via MS Teams, it actually worked well. We were all required to bring in a laptop computer to work from, I used this opportunity to navigate safety websites as he spoke. I was able to hold my attention and I was busy downloading documents related to the issues he discussed.

I had a Google Docs page open, a new page every day where I nook notes and copied links for future reference. I organised my notes under sub-headings so I can review my notes in the future. I also used this time to download resources such as the Act, Regulations, Codes of Conduct, Guidance Notes and Safety Alerts compatible with my industry. I also downloaded other pdf resources as required, using a laptop for the course was great. I set up my folders as I was listening, I was taking notes the whole time, even now, I still refer to this course content.

This is adult education, we were a small but motivated group, we didn’t need to be told what to do. With a remote facilitator, he had a camera so could see what we were up to. The more technology enabled assisted those in the class that were a little slower, we worked as a team and made the experience positive for everyone. It was great as people were there because they wanted to be there, it was a motivated group.

The second day was concerned with hazards and risk identification. In the morning we had to draw up our own inspection checklists, that was easy for me. That was concerned with creating my inspection checklist for my workplace, I now use this checklist in the engineering workshops. We then made an inspection of the premises, that was a good practical project. We actually have a similar project for our first year safety assessment for apprentices,they make an inspection of our engineering workshops.

The later part of the second session was concerned with preparing our face-to-face presentation to the group. I decided on my topic and began to create my PowerPoint presentation. I decided to make mine a modified problem-based learning exercise, this would enable group participation. This couldn’t really be a true problem-based learning exercise, I posed a problem to the group and invited discussion to ensure they were engaged.

We had a limited time frame, so I couldn’t request them to research their learning materials, so I provided them with details in order for them to provide an informed discussion. As it turns out, we had a rigger in the class, so a subject matter expert really made the discussion interesting. He provided real insight from an industry perspective.

So after lunch on day four, the second half of the day was reserved for presentations. With masks on, people were hyperventilating, they were shaking and visibly rattled. I was a little surprised, I am used to this now so I didn’t want to let these people catch me out in the emotion. A number of people wanted to get their presentations out first, I was ok with that – although I wanted to go first.

As my presentation was designed around a workplace learning project, the intention was to include all the participants and make the presentation an active process. The problem-based learning exercise was based on the overhead bridge crane in our workshop, who can operate the crane and rig loads. The feedback was excellent and everyone was involved, I received some differing perspectives and formulated some ideas from the session.