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ASBESTOS NEWS
Washington Navy Yard Case Study Report: Training
Process
Asbestos in the news: The Washington Navy Yard job training process
The attorneys at the personal injury law firm of Weitz & Luxenberg have decades of experience defending victim’s rights in practice areas that include: accidents/general injury, dangerous drugs, medical malpractice, and environmental pollutants.
NEWS UPDATE:
Asbestos-related news: Read about the training process for environmental cleanup workers hired for the Washington Navy Yard site.
AHOHC, which conducted the environmental part of the training process in the past, handed over the role to The Institute for Workplace Safety and Health in 2003. Since 1998 two full-time trainings have been conducted each year, with the environmental training taught over the first eight weeks and the soft skills training lasting from 2 to 6 weeks depending on the provider.
About 7 percent of training participants are Latino which created an opportunity to run one program in Spanish. Many of the Latino students were recruited from the unique partnership formed with the Arlington County School System, located in Virginia.
Trainees are unpaid while they are in training but they are given $25 per week to cover transportation costs. Trainees are also provided free pre-employment physicals which was a barrier to job placement earlier in the program. In addition, the training program added fitness tests, required by many employers, at no cost to the trainee.
During the environmental portion of the training, participants are trained in hazardous material cleanup, asbestos and lead paint abatement, general construction, industrial safety, first aid/CPR, control of biochemical hazards in construction, and other topics.
A contractors' forum, held in 2001, allowed the program to hear what additional skills contractors required from the trainees. This forum uncovered a need for radiation safety training. Now a staple of the program, radiation safety training has increased job placements of graduates within the hazardous waste hauling industry.
Following the environmental training is the “soft skills” part of the training course, consisting of how to prepare a resume, interview skills and addressing workplace problems. More recently, personal finance and diversity education have been added to the program. STRIVE DC provides soft skills training for trainees it had recruited while AHOHC and Covenant House Washington provides training for the rest of the class.
The soft skills training curriculum is constantly changing, depending on individual class needs. A trainee provider said that this part of the training is always a struggle since it is tough to assess what the class needs, and topics covered are not always relevant to 100 percent of the class.
Other skills addressed during the soft skills training include math and reading for those students that scored low in those areas on the assessment test given during orientation. The math and reading components of the soft skills training has significantly increased since 1999. And for those trainees who did not already possess a GED or diploma, STRIVE DC offers a GED program.
On average, classes begin with approximately 25 students and graduate between 16-22 students. Many of the students who drop out of the program due to outside pressures such as childcare, financial concerns, etc.
Courtesy of the EPA
see also:
Washington Navy Yard asbestos site
Asbestos-related news on the Washington Navy Yard siteCase study report on asbestos and the Washington Navy Yard site
Asbestos employers’ feedback, Washington Navy Yard
Asbestos news: Washington Navy Yard Report on employer feedbackAsbestos news: Employer feedback from Washington Navy Yard report
Washington D.C. shipyards
Workers at Washington DC shipyards were exposed to asbestosImportant information on asbestos for Washington DC shipyards workers
