Elementary Road Safety Your ERS leadership team

A variety of stakeholders must be involved to make your Elementary Road Safety (ERS) project a success.

The lead stakeholder is typically a school committee driving the idea of change, together with local government, planners and enforcement representatives who have the power to implement change. 

Ideally, each ERS leadership team should leverage an existing committee already active in your school, such as a parent council, safety committee or active travel committee.

Recommendations for team members 

Set up and plan the first team meeting

Once you have your group together, you need to meet. Work with your local officials to see if any existing local traffic data is available for your school zone and review that information early on.   

You will need to set up a plan to recruit volunteers, whether from your committee or further out in the community, for data collection and survey work you’ll do to gather the information you need before you make any decisions on safety interventions to pursue. 

Complete your School Zone Safety Assessment 

Before considering any safe school zone interventions, your community should evaluate your school zone. You’ll use the information you collect to help choose the most-appropriate, evidence-based interventions. After your interventions are in place, you should evaluate the school zone again to measure change. 

Some of the measurements you will collect and assess before and after starting interventions include:

• information on driving behaviours in the school area
• how children travel to school (e.g., walking, cycling or being driven there in a vehicle), 
• physical features in the school zone (e.g., posted speed limit signs) 
• what parents and caregivers think about traffic danger near the school  

Measurement is important because it will help you understand if the interventions your community has put in place are having the effect you wanted to achieve, such as lower speeds, safer driving behaviours or fewer injuries.