Children's Safety Committee
The Children's Safety Village
The number one health risk of children of ages fourteen and under is not disease, kidnapping or drugs. It's Injuries! The statistics are staggering. Unintentional injuries from traffic accidents, drowning, fire, firearms and poisoning kill over 7,000 and permanently disable over 50,000 children each year in America—that's more than drugs and disease combined.
The Springfield Children's Safety Committee was formed to reduce the occurrence of preventable injuries through safety education. The committee is building a permanent facility adjacent to the UIS campus, called the Children's Safety Village, which will adequately support an injury prevention curriculum.
The Children's Safety Village is intended for children from preschool through eighth grade. Private groups of children can be accommodated, but the main thrust of the Children's Safety Village activities will involve preschool and school classes that are bused to and from the Village.
A major element of the Children's Safety Village is a small scale mock-up of a city environment including:
Paved street and sidewalks with pavement markings and traffic control signage. One intersection will have operating traffic signals.
Two streets will have railroad crossings with one operating flashing signal.
Small scaled buildings to clearly represent a city scene including six residences, a hospital, a bank, a fire station, a police station, city hall, supermarket, and a train station.
Local and state government personnel in addition to individual volunteers will present safety education at the village. Subjects that will be addressed in the program include:
- Motor vehicle safety
- Fire and burn protection
- Choking, suffocation and strangulation prevention
- Poisoning prevention
- Fall prevention
- Firearm injury prevention
- Bike and pedestrian safety
- Water safety
The Children's Safety Village will be a multi-purpose facility to provide both classroom and hands-on safety demonstrations. The Village will include a schoolhouse, a playground, the House of Hazards, a small-scale city and a storage barn. The schoolhouse will be the principal building with 2100 sq. ft. The schoolhouse will offer a large meeting room for classrooms, a small kitchen, restrooms, coat room, office and a mechanical and storage room.
The House of Hazards will be a structure that includes mockups of typical hazards that can be found in the home including such things as overloaded wiring, fire hazards, unprotected caustic cleaning fluids, etc. There will also be a room in which smoke can be injected to teach the proper way to evacuate a home during a fire.
The CSC needs your help in two ways:
1. Your tax deductible donation will help us buy the materials needed to complete our village and/or
2. Volunteering your time to help us build and complete the village. If you can help in any of these ways please call the number listed on the back of this brochure. Any and all help is greatly appreciated!
For donations:
Please make your check payable to:
Children's Safety Committee
47 Trailridge Lane
Springfield, IL 62704
Volunteering to work Please call 217-726-6122
