The Chair shall appoint a Laboratory Safety Coordinator whose duty it is to promote a safe work environment for individuals utilizing a department’s Instructional Laboratories/Workshops. The Laboratory Safety Coordinator, in conjunction with possible teaching assistants, will staff the department’s Instructional Laboratories/workshops whenever such facility is open for use. The
Laboratory Safety Coordinator may also fill the role of Department Safety Officer. The Chair shall also appoint a Laboratory Safety Coordinator for Research Laboratories for such facilities that are shared by multiple Principal Investigators or researchers.
The Laboratory Safety Coordinator shall be a professor, staff person or qualified teaching assistant. The duties of the Laboratory Safety Coordinator include, but need not be limited to, the following:
- Maintaining a file of Safety Data Sheets describing hazardous chemicals being used in each
- laboratory space and making this file accessible to anyone on request;
- Maintaining the relevant laboratory space and its equipment in safe working order;
- Having, on hand, Personal Protective Equipment that Laboratory Users are required to use but
- that they may not be required to furnish for themselves, as necessary;
- In coordination with the Responsible Person, requiring that Laboratory Users are certified and
- that they comply with safe working procedures;
- The authority to expel uncertified and non-cooperating Laboratory Users from the laboratory
- space;
- Generating accident reports documenting injuries that occur in the laboratory space and
- maintaining a file of these reports, consistent with IIT’s Incident Investigation Policy;
- Ensuring that safe Work Practice Controls are maintained in the relevant Instructional and
- research Laboratories;
- Denying access to Laboratory Users who have not received the requisite laboratory safety
- instruction, or who demonstrate an inability to follow establish laboratory space Work Practice
- Controls;
- Using their knowledge of safety to assist instructors in filling out required safety forms such as
- the Hazard Identification Form;
- Assisting the Responsible person in maintaining the relevant Laboratories in a safe operating
- condition; and
- Ensuring that there are no unforeseen Hazards caused by incompatible experiments run in the same area.