Keeping school students, staff, and visitors safe
Creating, reviewing, and maintaining your school evacuation diagrams and floor plans and safety signs is an extremely important part of ensuring staff, children and visitors can easily evacuate in the event of an emergency.
These measures are a great way for Early Childhood Educators and Child Care providers to fulfill their responsibilities for the health, safety, and wellbeing of the children in their care. It is also important to note that having these safety items installed in key locations such as near each exit of the premises is a must for any school or childcare location.
Why do we need school emergency and evacuation floor plans?
According to the NSW Government’s education website, “…all children, staff and visitors of your service must be able to evacuate safely from its location if required. School evacuation diagrams support effective evacuation in an emergency and are commonly used as key tools in a building’s emergency management arrangements (per the Australian Standard AS3745:2010 planning for emergencies in facilities (AS3745))”.
The Education and Care Services National Regulation 97 requires services to have emergency and evacuation floor plans prominently displayed near each exit. Your site’s school evacuation diagrams need review at least once every five years. These also need review when you make a change to the layout of your service premises floor plan (e.g. through renovations or additions). Make sure to update the validity date on school evacuation diagrams after you finish your review, even if you made no changes to the diagram.
School area map
The school area map is clear and easy to follow. The school area map has:
- two evacuation assembly areas on-site
- external evacuation routes
- surrounding streets and safe exit points marked
- emergency services access points marked
School evacuation diagrams
School evacuation diagrams are clear and easy to follow and displayed at each exit of the service premises (regulation 97(4)). School evacuation diagrams have:
- a pictorial diagram of the floor plan or area (at least 200mm x 150mm in size, A3)
- a title, for example EVACUATION DIAGRAM
- the ‘YOU ARE HERE’ location
- the designated exits, which shall be in green
- hose reels, marked in red
- hydrants, marked in red
- extinguishers, marked in red
- designated shelter-in-place location
- validation date of the plan
- location of primary and secondary assembly areas
- a legend.
Our school evacuation diagrams are fully compliant with Australian Standards as directed by the Department of Education and Training.
An Exit or Final Exit is defined as being an exit to a place of safety outside the building.
School Safety Signs
Signs around the school for safety purposes generally have a best place at the entrance to a school or on the perimeter to provide information to the public. These signs may inform the viewer that the school property is not for public use, is a smoke-free zone, or even that standing, or parking is not permitted during school hours.
School safety sign visibility
Signs prohibiting something are easily recognised by a black symbol on a white background with a red annulus and back slash. For example a no skating sign. Other signs can be recognised by their black or red text on a white background.
School safety signs are vital to every school and an important part of keeping students, staff, and visitors safe on premises. Consider having signs that make safety fun, such as brightly crossing signs with reminders of how to cross safely and be aware of your surroundings. Or signs reminding kids to ‘take care, stop, look & think when leaving the school’.
Vehicle safety and access signs
Your safety signs could also state when vehicles are allowed on premise for things like delivery or parent pick up. It’s also important to make sure that your emergency assembly points have signs showing everyone where to go and assemble safely.
If your premise has appointed staff parking areas, having signs that let visitors know where they are not allowed to park directing them to where they can park will go a long way to making sure you’re limiting risk and therefore liability for the car parks.
First aid signs
Another very important safety sign to have around the premises is for the location of first aid kits and fire extinguishers. These are the most commonly needed pieces of safety equipment.
Other school safety signs
Other types of safety signs that you may consider for your school or childcare establishment:
- Hazardous agents (biological and chemical)
- Physical hazards (lasers and magnetic field)
- Precautions (no food or drink allowed)
- Compulsory personal protective equipment (lab coats, eye protection, gloves).
Can you be too safe?
If you’re not wrapping the kids in bubble wrap, it’s safe to say that installing safety signs and evacuation diagrams around the school in key locations is not being “too safe”. As a care provider or business owner you have a duty of care to the people in your buildings and ensuring that there is appropriate signage does that.
Having the signage showing where potential hazards may be, such as a caution sign on a stairwell that might be slippery when wet, also decreases the chances of a lawsuit if an accident did occur.
Getting help with school safety signage
Whatever signage you need, from fire safety to prohibition or traffic to emergency information the staff at Safety Maps has the knowledge and expertise to ensure your school is fully decked out in all the appropriate safety needs. We can also help you create or update your evacuation diagrams and make sure they’ve been installed in all the appropriate locations across the premises.
If you’re looking for a company that is an industry graphics specialist who supplies visual solutions to their clients who require standards compliant signage, look no further than Safety Maps. With over 20 years of experience and a portfolio more than 5,000 project sites across all industries from hospitality to mining. Safety Maps is one of Australia’s most reputable safety signage companies.
Contact Safety Maps today for your no-obligation free quote on (02) 8078 0302. Alternatively feel free to send us a direct email at or visit our website and fill out our contact form by clicking here.
