Earlier this year, Eldorado Gold celebrated International Safety Week to highlight the importance of safety, both at the workplace and at home.
One of the week’s highlights for Hellas Gold, Eldorado Gold’s Greek subsidiary, was an interactive event with children from the Stratoni, Stageira and Stratoniki villages near our Kassandra Mines in northern Greece. The 2-hour event was designed to influence safe behaviour at home, with messages from the children to their parents about being safe in the workplace so they can return home to their families.
“The goal of this event was threefold”, said Ben Robinson, Manager Health, Safety and Training. “It allowed us to learn about how the next generation interprets safety rules, to encourage youth to remind their parents about the importance of returning home safely, and to create materials to show how much employees children look forward to seeing them after every shift.”
Ben says that “encouraging ‘positive’ safety early in young people’s lives, helps to plant the seed of change in how individuals approach safety in their everyday lives.”
Organized and orchestrated by Marianna Karava and Filio Zagoraki, both members of the health and safety team for Kassandra Mines, the women saw an opportunity to host an event to help educate children in a fun and interactive way about using simple practices that would help them be safe in their daily lives.
“Kassandra Mines has a long history, and a bright future, it is important for us to teach the next generation based on our experience to help keep them safe”, said Marianna. “As adults, we can always take learnings from children as they see the world in a brand new light.”
One of the activities enjoyed the most was learning and singing a song, “Take care” during a mini-concert for their parents. “The children were so delighted to share what they learnt during the activity with their parents, their grins were ear-to-ear!” Ben recalls.
Below is a video recording of their song.
Other activities included:
- Creating posters about the importance of safety
- Writing messages to their parents about staying safe at work, including:
- Always follows safety signs
- Always wear your helmet
- Drive carefully all the time
- Be careful with chemicals
- Stop and think, apply good housekeeping
- Play-acting each of the Golden Rules
What impressed the organizers of the event, was the manner in which the children quickly identified the difference between safe and unsafe behaviour. While learning and talking about the Golden Rules, the children transformed each of the ten rules into an experience reflective of their everyday life. The way they adapted to the rules through experiential learning, was a unique way to demonstrate and learn what can happen if you are not careful.
