5 Tips for Building Your School District’s Event Safety Plan

A new school year brings fresh adventures with a calendar full of field trips, fall carnivals, pep rallies, spirit days, and outdoor events. For students, these activities are some of the most memorable moments of the school year. For administrators, risk managers, and teachers, they can also represent significant risk. The time to build your safety framework is before the first bus leaves the parking lot, not after the first claim arrives on your desk.

“One of the most common misconceptions among school staff is that a signed permission slip ends the district’s liability,” said Sara Gibson, Senior Risk Control Manager at Safety National. “Courts routinely hold public school districts responsible for field trip injuries even when waivers were signed, particularly when negligent supervision, unsafe transportation, or failure to warn of a known hazard is involved. Waivers establish assumption of risk for inherent hazards, but they are not a substitute for controls.”

These five steps can help districts strengthen their field trip and special event safety plans before students, staff, and volunteers head off campus.

1. Establish a list of prohibited activities.

A written board policy naming outright-prohibited activities, like bungee jumping, consumer fireworks, homemade equipment, and open-water events without a structured safety plan, removes the guesswork and prevents well-meaning staff from approving something the district’s general liability policy does not cover.

2. Build a tiered approval workflow.

Day trips and school carnivals should not require the same approval path as an overnight wilderness expedition. Matching approval level to risk level saves time where it is safe to do so and adds rigor where it matters most.

3. Audit your vendor relationships.

Every vendor operating an inflatable, ropes course, dunk tank, or amusement ride at a school event needs a current certificate of insurance naming the district as additional insured. Pull last year’s event files now and identify any gaps before this year’s contracts are signed.

4. Train your chaperones and event leads.

Supervision is the single most cited failure in school event and field trip claims. Establishing your chaperone ratios, briefing protocols, and emergency action plan requirements at the start of the year makes the difference.

5. Create a near-miss reporting culture.

The most valuable safety information your district has is the incident that almost happened. Build a simple, blame-free reporting process so that close calls on field days and field trips get documented and addressed before they become claims.