WalkSafe Program

The WalkSafe Program, was developed and implemented by the Ryder Trauma Center at the University of Miami School of Medicine/Jackson Memorial Medical Center and funded by the Florida Department of Transportation and the Trauma Research Institute at the Ryder Trauma Center.

Purpose
The purpose of the program is reduce pediatric pedestrian injury and fatality by providing WalkSafe: An elementary school based pedestrian injury prevention program. This is a multi-agency program with the primary focus being safety education provided in the classrooms in the Miami-Dade public schools, engineering modifications around the elementary schools through the Department of Public Works, and enforcement through the Miami-Dade Police Department.
Background

Miami-Dade County has the highest incidence of pedestrian injuries and fatalities in the State of Florida . Every year a significant number of children are struck by motor vehicles in the morning before school and after school between the hours of 3-6pm. Phase I and II of the study has been completed and findings from 16 elementary school from a high risk district for pediatric pedestrian injury in Miami-Dade county has demonstrated that elementary school children are able to learn how to cross the street safely after receiving the WalkSafe program. Our study evaluated the effectiveness of this injury prevention program with the primary component being education. An observational component was included but was a preliminary attempt at observing children's street crossing behaviors. However, in order to decrease the number of injuries and fatalities for young pedestrians, a combination of efforts by a number of agencies is clearly needed. The successful implementation of elementary school-based injury prevention program in a high-risk district was found to be an effective strategy to reduce the number of PHBC cases, to increase pedestrian knowledge and awareness, and to observe short-term behavioral changes.

Phase III of the study was implemented October 8-10th, 2003 to include all 193 elementary schools in Miami-Dade county. Future research needs to study the implementation of this school based pedestrian injury prevention model in an entire county, and then expand the program statewide.

Program Objectives

• To lower the incidence of Pediatric Pedestrian Trauma.
• To implement a formal educational school based program for elementary school children (K-5).
• To create a comprehensive community oriented multi-agency program involving education, engineering and enforcement to decrease the number of pediatric pedestrian injuries.
• To evaluate a pediatric pedestrian injury prevention program.
• To implement the WalkSafe program on a yearly basis.

Program Implementation
The WalkSafe curriculum will be taught yearly to coincide with the International Walk to School Day the beginning of October. The WalkSafe program will be held on three consecutive days for daily half hour sessions. The curriculum of the WalkSafe program currently supports the K-5 objectives of the competency based curriculum for Miami-Dade County Public Schools.
The Assistant Principals and Physical Education teachers would be trained for 1 hour in regional training sessions by the WalkSafe instructors in September 2003. They will in turn be responsible for training the teachers at their schools so that they will be able to teach the curriculum in their classrooms. The WalkSafe curriculum would be made available to all teachers on the MDCPS website.

Contact Information

WalkSafe Office:
Phone: 305-243-8115
Fax: 305-243-8114
Website: Miami-Dade County School Board website or
www.cure.fau.edu/pedcenter

Program Director:
Gillian Hotz, PhD
Division of Trauma and Surgical Critical Care
Daughtry Family Department of Surgery
University of Miami School of Medicine/ Jackson Memorial Medical Center