Welcome to the SR4S Newsletter July 2024 Edition
Let’s make every school journey safe for our kids!
Each day 500 children are killed in preventable traffic crashes around?the world. Sometimes they are killed just yards from the school entrance.
Each traffic death and injury violates a child’s right to an education.
Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) is an award-winning evidence-based programme of tools, training and support to measure, manage and communicate the risk children are exposed to on a journey to school.
SR4S is informing strategic investment in infrastructure upgrades saving lives and preventing serious injuries every day. It is also empowering global and community advocacy to address the leading killer of young people world-wide – road traffic deaths.
Find out below how our SR4S partners around the world are making school journeys safer for children!
STAR RATING FOR SCHOOLS UPDATES
Exciting updates: New features, languages, and training opportunities
We have made some updates to the Star Rating for Schools app!
?These include:
YOUTH ENGAGEMENT APP UPDATES
Empowering youth for safer roads: The evolution of the Youth Engagement App
Young people are disproportionately impacted by road traffic injuries. To empower them, the Youth Engagement App?(YEA) allows students to identify and report safety concerns around their schools. This data helps authorities pinpoint problem areas and prioritize improvements, leading to safer roads for everyone. YEA was developed as part of the?AI&Me: Empowering Youth for Safer Roads?Project funded by Fondation Botnar and co-funded by?FIA Foundation. It is more than just an app. It is an interactive platform that enables young individuals to identify and report road safety conditions in the vicinity of their schools with ease.
The app recently received upgrades for a smoother user experience. These include offline functionality, improved map features, and additional languages. With wider accessibility, YEA is putting the power to create safer roads directly in the hands of young people around the world.
SCHOOL ROAD ASSESSMENTS AND UPGRADES
Safe crossings, safe journeys: How Moldova is prioritizing children’s safety on the road
The SR4S tool has helped to?assess the safety of nine schools in Moldova in 2023. Subsequently, three school zones in Balti, Singerei, and Ungheni municipalities saw significant upgrades particularly safer crossings for vulnerable road users (VRUs), leading to a safety level improvement to 4-5 stars.
The “Safe crossings – safe journeys” project, implemented by the?Automobile Club of Moldova (ACM)?aimed to:
These interventions directly benefit over?3,000 students, making their commutes to and from school safer. This positive impact extends to parents, grandparents, friends, neighbors, and especially those with limited mobility.? The project’s success was made possible by the financial support of the FIA – Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile and FIA Foundation (FIA Road Safety Grant Programme). The?Automobile Club of Moldova (ACM)?also received valuable support from 联合国儿童基金会 Moldova?and EASST .
School safety in Palestine: Local action for global child road safety crisis
In Palestine, a?recent project was implemented to improve traffic safety near Al-Jeeb Secondary School for Boys in Jerusalem Governorate and to understand the importance of safe commutes for students. Funded by the FIA – Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA)?and FIA Foundation through their?FIA Road Safety Grant Programme, this initiative prioritizes student safety on their way to and from school.
The project, a collaboration between the?Palestinian Motor Sport and Motorcycle Federation (PMSMF), the?Palestinian National Institute of Public Health, and the?Ministry of Public Works and Housing, addresses key areas around the school to create a safer environment through various safety measures, including:
This project serves as a model for enhancing school zone safety across Palestine. By following the Safe System Approach, which prioritizes safer infrastructure for children’s travel routes, similar projects have the potential to make a real difference by saving lives and preventing injuries among students, contributing to a decrease in the national and global road crash crisis for school children.
Safer school zones in Bolivia: La Paz implements collaborative project for enhanced safety
The Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) Región IV - Latinoamérica office has been working on improving school safety in Latin America since 2018 using Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) to assess safety of school infrastructure for informed interventions. While SR4S assessments have been conducted in over 120 schools across Chile, Ecuador, Colombia, Paraguay, Guatemala, Panama, and Uruguay, only 70 have seen concrete safety improvements. This highlights the need for continued efforts to translate assessments into action.
To address this, Bolivia’s La Paz is spearheading a collaborative project to improve safety around four schools. By combining assessments, funding, and training, the initiative aims to implement practical solutions like better road markings, traffic lights, and speed bumps, ultimately creating safer school zones and reducing traffic-related injuries among children.?This is part of?the?broader?FIA Road Safety Grant Programme and supported by the FIA Foundation in an effort to make schools safer across the region.
Leveraging regional strengths for safer school zones across Asia Pacific with SR4S in Nepal
In April 2024, the AIP Foundation team visited the?Nepal Automobiles’ Association to?meet with local government and school representatives of two target schools in Lalitpur district and Dhulikhel municipality. The objectives were to visit?the schools and observe the traffic situation and infrastructure conditions, carry out school assessments using the SR4S tool and meet?with local government officials and the NASA team to provide the local government stakeholders with the Star Rating for Schools project details and overview.
After attending a FIA Region II Clubs training course on the SR4S methodology (funded by the FIA Foundation),?the Nepal Automobiles’ Association was selected and secured funding for?school zone upgrades and support in implementation. In the next few months, the Nepal Automobiles' Association will continue to work with the local government to develop the designs for road infrastructure upgrades and school zone modifications.
AI&ME: EMPOWERING YOUTH FOR SAFER ROADS PROJECT
领英推荐
AI&Me: Empowering youth for safer roads updates
AIP Foundation ’s innovative Big Data and AI road safety program,?AI&Me: Empowering Youth for Safer Roads, has been positively engaging youth to raise their voices for safe mobility across Vietnam for three years. ? Earlier this year, the?AI&Me?program wrapped up across Yen Bai, Gia Lai and Ho Chi Minh City, and the following successful results were celebrated:
During its course, the program championed three technological?innovations:?the Big Data Screening Methodology, Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) and the Youth Engagement App (YEA). ? In early June 2024, the AI&ME Scalability Analysis Report was released. The report provides a better understanding of how the?three?digital initiatives complement and provide a comprehensive approach to identify high-risk?school zones. In addition, the report explains?why?the framework has?potential to?scale up in different contexts based on the?four?essential criteria?being?Accessibility, Acceptability, Implementation Cost and Sustainability, and?assesses?how it fits?within?the global strategy for future intervention solutions.
Later in the month, AIP Foundation , in collaboration with Fondation Botnar , iRAP , and the FIA Foundation , proudly announced?the launch of the public-facing report on the?AI&Me: Empowering Youth for Safer Roads?program. This comprehensive document highlights how the project successfully drove change through youth empowerment and innovative technology, detailing the proof-of-concept process, results, lessons learned, and potential for scaling. ? The launch of the report marks a significant step in the program, and demonstrates how engaging dialogues among adolescents and decision-makers is vital to spark change toward a healthy environment for all stakeholders – for?the successful engagement of over 9 million beneficiaries.
Safe school zones in Yen Bai province, Vietnam
In Yen Bai, 22 out of 25 schools were ranked as 1 star, indicating the most dangerous level. Under the?AI&Me?program, the AIP Foundation collaborated with the Yen Bai Traffic Safety Committee to develop a safe school zone model at Hoang Quoc Viet High School. The modifications include:
Notably, this is the first crosswalk painted in red in Yen Bai province, potentially serving as a model for future road upgrades.?These comprehensive interventions have improved the infrastructure safety of the school entrance from 1.0 to 4.0 stars. ? Apart from Hoang Quoc Viet High School, seven other schools were enhanced through donor-funded projects, and the local government created and executed 87 modification items at 13 other schools after various stakeholders, including the public and private sectors, collaborated to enhance safety. ?
Based on the results and empirical evidence from the pilot phase in three provinces in Vietnam, the?AI&Me?program has confirmed the viability of the approach and the potential to replicate the successful and cost-efficient intervention in other countries?worldwide.
TRAINING, EVENTS AND LATEST RESOURCES
SR4S & YEA feature at the upcoming Africa Road Safety Seminar
Safer roads and school journeys will be an essential focus of the Africa Road Safety Seminar from 8-9 October in Nairobi – don’t miss your place, register today!
iRAP is supporting the Global Road Safety Partnership ?and the Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS), in association with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA)?, to coordinate the two-day event. A sessions will focus on safer school journeys:?
3M champions school safety in Latin America with SR4S
In April 2024, SR4S Global Programme Partner 3M 公司 , iRAP , and local stakeholders joined forces to train local engineers in Costa Rica and 100 police officers in Guatemala on iRAP and Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) methodologies. These training activities?in Latin America reflect 3M’s broader mission to bring families home safely.
Since 2020, 3M has been a proud Global Programme Partner of SR4S. Through this partnership, 3M provides financial support to maintain the SR4S tool and make it freely available to partners worldwide who share the goal of improving school safety.
Putting children first: Baguio city (Philippines) launches project for safer school zones
University of the Philippines – National Center for Transportation Studies (UP-NCTS), along with?Clean Air Asia,?Sustainable Mobility in Metropolitan Regions in ASEAN (SMMR), and Baguio City joined forces to equip local stakeholders with the tools to create safer school zones.
From assessment to action: SR4S makes a difference in Botswana schools
On 23 May, the?Australian College of Road Safety (ACRS) International Outreach Chapter (IOC)?hosted an online event focusing on the Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) programme and its success in Botswana.?
120 years of FIA: Celebrating partnerships for safer journeys
FIA mobility clubs are working with iRAP in local partnerships to deliver the?Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) programme?for safer school journeys.
Clubs are embracing the programme supported by the?FIA School Assessment Toolkit?and annual?Road Safety Grants programme, supported by the FIA Foundation.
Our Star Rating for Schools Programme is made possible by:
AIP Foundation Child Health Initiative EASST Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile Fundacion Gonzalo Rodriguez Global Alliance of NGOs for Road Safety Global Road Safety Partnership International Road Federation (IRF) Safe Kids Worldwide YOURS World Resources Institute