A new online resource for chemical safety and green chemistry in science education

Abstract

Science and chemistry teachers often feel that they have insufficient knowledge about the legal requirements concerning proper handling of chemicals. To help teachers and technicians, we have developed an online resource with information and tools for the various aspects of chemical safety, such as legislation, risk assessment, storage, labelling and waste handling, including a framework for routines and training for staff and students. Additionally, the resource introduces the concept of green chemistry, an emerging field within chemistry education, and provides examples on how teachers could work with green chemistry principles in the science and chemistry classroom. The aim is that this extensive online material, covering the most important aspects of health, safety and environmental work in school science education, can serve as a useful resource for school leaders, teachers, technicians and science teacher educators in their work with these issues. The resource was developed by partners from the Universities of Helsinki, Ljubljana, Oslo, and Stockholm and co-funded by the Erasmus+ program of the European Union. The content is published in five languages and is freely available at https://chesse.org.

Keywords

• chemical safety
• chemistry education
• green chemistry
• online learning resource
• science education