Choose a journal article from the CSU Online Library that de
Choose a journal article from the CSU Online Library that de.
Choose a journal article from the CSU Online Library that deals with any of the material presented in the first four units of this course. The article itself must be more than one page in length. The EBSCO Database (Business Source Complete) is a good source of journals for safety related articles. If you have a specific area of interest that is covered later in the course, you may ask for professor approval. our Article Critique must be two to four pages in length, double spaced. All sources used, including the textbook, must be referenced; paraphrased and quoted material must have accompanying citations.Some suggested topics include the organizational role of the safety professional, the business of safety, hazard avoidance models, current regulatory trends in occupational safety and health, the safety professional s role in disaster preparedness, workplace standards, and current occupational health issues. The Article Critique must include the following components: a brief introduction to the article, a summary and analysis of the key points in the article, whether or not the article supports the concepts as presented in the textbook , and a summary of the article s conclusions and your own opinions. Information about accessing the Blackboard Grading Rubric for this assignment is provided below.article- Page i GAO-17-178 OHSA Training Letter 1 Background3 OSHA s Outreach Training Program Reflects Attributes of a Well-Designed Training Program8 Outreach Training Providers Use Automated and Manual Processes and Controls to Document Students Successful Course Completion12 OSHA Oversees Training Providers by Collecting Data and Investigating Complaints, and Has Taken Some Steps to Assess Program Results16 Agency Comments24 Appendix IGAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments26TablesTable 1: Extent to Which the Design of OSHA s Outreach Training Program Reflects GAO Identified Attributes for a Well-Designed Training Program9 Table 2: Selected OSHA Requirements for the 10-hour Construction Outreach Training Course11 Table 3: 11 Performance Elements OSHA Uses to Assess the Education Centers Performance, Fiscal Year 201517 FiguresFigure 1: Growth in OSHA s Outreach Training Program Number of Workers Trained From Fiscal Year 2000 to 20167 Figure 2: OSHA Outreach Training Participants by Course Type, Fiscal Year 20168 Figure 3: Course Completion Card Processing for OSHA s In-person and Online Outreach Training13 Figure 4: Results of OSHA s Monitoring of the Education Centers by Performance Element, Fiscal Year 201519 Figure 5: OSHA Targets for Number of Workers Trained through Its Outreach Training Program and Actual Number of Workers Trained, Fiscal Years 2011-201622 Figure 6: OSHA s Requirements for Assessing Outreach Training Compared to Kirkpatrick Levels of Evaluation23 Contents Page ii GAO-17-178 OHSA TrainingAbbreviationsDOLDepartment of Labor Education CentersOSHA Training Institute Education Centers IAC ET International Association for Continuing Education and Training O SHA Occupational Safety and Health Administration O SH Ac t Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright protection in the United States. The published product may be reproduced and distributed in its entirety without further permission from GAO. However, because this work may contain copyrighted images or other material, permission from the copyright holder may be necessary if you wish to reproduce this material separately.Page 1 GAO-17-178 OHSA Training441 G St. N.W.Washington, DC 20548February 7, 2017 The Honorable Tim Walberg Chairman Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor, and PensionsCommittee on Education and the Workforce House of RepresentativesDear Mr. Chairman:In 2014, approximately 4,800 workers died on the job, and employers reported about 3 million nonfatal work-related injuries, according to data collected by the Department of Labor (DOL). DOL s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is responsible for protecting the safety and health of the nation s workers under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (OSH Act).1 Ensuring that workers are properly trained in recognizing and avoiding workplace hazards is an important component in establishing and maintaining a safe and healthy workplace. In fiscal year 2016, approximately 900,000 workers were trained in job hazard recognition and avoidance through OSHA s Outreach Training Program.2 In-person Outreach Training is provided to workers by Outreach trainers, safety professionals who have taken train-the-trainer courses at OSHA Training Institute Education Centers (Education Centers), which are a national network of nonprofit organizations authorized by OSHA to deliver various types of occupational safety and health training. Since 2001, OSHA has also allowed Outreach Training courses to be delivered online through authorized vendors. Participation in the program has grown substantially over time and although most workers take the training in-person, workers are increasingly taking the courses online. You asked us to review OSHA s administration of the program, including the in-person and online training, and to determine how OSHA assesses the results of the program.This report examines (1) the extent to which OSHA s Outreach Training Program aligns with leading practices in designing an effective training 1 Pub. L. No. 91-596, 84 Stat. 1590 (codified as amended at 29 U.S.C. 553, 651-78).2 OSHA s Outreach Training Program is designed for workers, but according to OSHA officials, individuals trained can include workers, employers, safety professionals, supervisors, and students in high school and college. In this report, we use the term workers to refer collectively to all of these groups. LetterPage 2 GAO-17-178 OHSA Trainingprogram, (2) the process OSHA uses to document students successful completion of the training and the extent to which internal controls are in place to assure completion is accurately documented, and (3) how OSHA oversees training providers and assesses the results of the program.To address all of our objectives, we interviewed OSHA officials; representatives from all nine online training providers; and representatives from five Education Centers, selected because they had among the highest number of Outreach Training participants of all 27 Education Centers in fiscal year 2015. Together, the 5 Education Centers accounted for 46 percent of workers trained in-person that year.3 We also observed three Outreach Training courses two in-person and one online. Our observations from these training courses are intended to be illustrative, and are not generalizable. To determine the extent to which the design of the Outreach Training Program reflects leading practices, we compared the information obtained through interviews with OSHA officials and agency documentation to practices identified in GAO s guide for assessing training and federal internal control standards.4 While GAO s guide for assessing training is intended to help federal agencies review training and development programs for their employees, the attributes of effective training programs identified in the guide are derived from sources that are generally applicable to training and can be used to review a particular agency program or activity. To examine the process for documenting successful course completion, we reviewed (1) OSHA s policies and procedures for issuing course completion cards and (2) other information obtained from OSHA, the online training providers, and the five Education Centers. We also analyzed the latest OSHA data available at the time of our review from fiscal years 2012 through 2016 on the timeframes for processing requests from online training providers for 3 There are currently 27 Education Centers.4 GAO, Human Capital: A Guide for Assessing Strategic Training and Development Efforts in the Federal Government, GAO-04-546G (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 1, 2004) and GAO, Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government, GAO-14-704G, (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 10, 2014). GAO s guide for assessing training summarizes attributes of effective training programs related to four components of the training process: (1) planning/front-end analysis, (2) design/development, (3) implementation, and (4) evaluation. GAO obtained the information in this guide through consultations with government officials and experts in the private sector, academia, and nonprofit organizations; examinations of laws and regulations related to training and development in the federal government; and a review of the literature on training and development issues. Page 3 GAO-17-178 OHSA Trainingcourse completion cards.5 We assessed the reliability of OSHA s card processing data by (1) performing electronic testing of required data elements, (2) reviewing existing information about the data and the system that produced them, and (3) interviewing agency officials knowledgeable about the data. Based on these reviews, we determined that the data were sufficiently reliable for our purposes. To determine how OSHA oversees Outreach Training providers and assesses the results of the program, we reviewed OSHA s reporting requirements for training providers, monitoring procedures, and agency monitoring reports. We also compared OSHA s efforts to training evaluation practices in GAO s training guide (GAO-04-546G) and federal internal control standards.We conducted this performance audit from February 2016 to February 2017 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.OSHA is the federal agency responsible for administering the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, as amended (OSH Act), which was enacted to assure safe and healthful working conditions for the nation s workers.6 As authorized by the act, OSHA sets and enforces occupational safety and health standards, which are regulations that set forth specific safety and health requirements with which covered 5 We did not analyze data on how long it takes for the Education Centers to process course completion cards for workers who take the training in person because the Education Centers use different information systems to process the cards and no single data source exists that would allow us to analyze the data.6 Pub. L. No. 91-596, 84 Stat. 1590 (codified as amended at 29 U.S.C. 553, 651-678). Under the OSH Act, states may choose to operate their own occupational safety and health programs in accordance with state plans approved by OSHA. BackgroundPage 4 GAO-17-178 OHSA Trainingemployers must comply.7 Among its other responsibilities under the OSH Act, OSHA is also required to provide for the establishment and supervision of training programs to help workers and employers recognize, avoid, and prevent workplace safety and health hazards.8The Outreach Training Program is the agency s primary way to offer training for workers in the basics of occupational safety and health, according to OSHA.9 Outreach Training includes voluntary 10-hour and 30-hour safety courses designed to provide basic hazard awareness training for workers in construction, maritime, and general industry, and a 15-hour course for workers at disaster sites. The training covers how to recognize and prevent hazards on a jobsite, workers rights, employers responsibilities, and how to file a complaint. The 30-hour courses are intended to provide more in-depth training to workers who have some safety responsibility. Workers that successfully complete an OSHA Outreach Training Program course receive a student course completion card. The student course completion cards in Construction, General Industry, and Disaster Site do not have an expiration date; however, the Maritime Outreach Training student course completion cards expire 5 years after completing the training.While OSHA does not require workers to take its Outreach Training courses, depending on their jobs and where the workers are located, they may be subject to other requirements to show an OSHA course 7 The OSH Act generally covers private sector employers and requires most federal agencies to maintain occupational safety and health programs that are consistent with OSHA standards. States that operate their own programs may cover private sector employers and must cover state and local government employers. These states may set and enforce their own standards, provided they are at least as effective as OSHA s . OSHA enforces its occupational safety and health standards (referred to in this report as OS H A standards ) by conducting inspections in response to complaints or on its own initiative, and may issue citations to employers it finds have violated the OSH Act or OSHA regulations.8 29 U.S.C. 670(c). 9 In addition to the Outreach Training Program, OSHA also engages in other efforts to provide training to workers. For example, OSHA administers the Susan Harwood Training Grants Program, which provides competitive grants to nonprofit organizations to provide training and education programs for employers and workers on the recognition, avoidance, and prevention of workplace safety and health hazards. OSHA also provides training for federal and state compliance officers through its OSHA Training Institute; private sector workers and federal workers from agencies other than OSHA may receive training from the OSHA Training Institute when space is available.Page 5 GAO-17-178 OHSA Trainingcompletion card to demonstrate they completed the training.10 For example, some states, municipalities, unions, and employers may require workers to take an OSHA Outreach Training course as a condition of employment for certain jobs, and OSHA maintains a list of states and municipalities that have such a requirement. According to OSHA s list, seven states (Connecticut, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, and Rhode Island), and three municipalities ( Miam i-Dade County, New York City, and Philadelphia) require certain workers to take some form of OSHA Outreach Training or an equivalent training. For example, all of these states and municipalities require certain workers on public construction projects to take a 10-hour construction safety course. Some, including Nevada and Philadelphia, also require this training for workers on private construction projects.Outreach Training courses are delivered by OSHA-authorized external training providers that receive no funding from OSHA, but instead, rely on tuition and fees from training participants to cover the cost of the training. The types of training providers include Education Centers, which train Outreach trainers to deliver in-person Outreach Training courses to workers, and online training providers. Education Centers: OSHA has nonfinancial cooperative agreements with 27 Education Centers which are typically universities to provide occupational safety and health training to workers and employers on behalf of OSHA.11 The Education Centers have two main roles under the Outreach Training Program: (1) conduct in-person train-the-trainer courses to qualified individuals interested in becoming authorized Outreach trainers; and (2) act as an authorized training organization for the Outreach trainers by monitoring Outreach trainers through records audits and training observations and by processing course completion cards that Outreach trainers request on behalf of the workers who take their courses. OSHA selected the Education Centers through a formal competitive application process. Successful 10 Although some OSHA standards require covered employers to provide certain types of training for their workers, OSHA Outreach Training does not fulfill the training requirements found in OSHA standards. 11 In addition to their Outreach Training Program responsibilities, the Education Centers are responsible for delivering other occupational safety and health courses to workers and employers on behalf of OSHA. The other offerings include courses on OSHA standards and special topics, such as recordkeeping, machine guarding, and fall arrest system
Choose a journal article from the CSU Online Library that de
