Since October 2016, EASST partner, the National Automobile Club of Azerbaijan (AMAK) have visited 10 schools and pre-schools in Baku, working with teachers and university volunteers to introduce road safety learning to over 800 children using EASST’s new Road Safety Education Pack.
As part of this project, school children across Baku were invited to take part in a five round inter-school competition where they were asked to demonstrate their road safety knowledge as well as to produce materials that could be used to promote road safety more widely.
To mark the final stage of the project, AMAK organised a dedicated “Saving Kids Lives” event to announce the competition winners, and present certificates and gifts to the children, teachers and volunteer students who took part.
Among the event participants were the children’s parents, who were invited as part of AMAK’s wider aim to broaden the impact of the children’s knowledge, and highlight the responsibility of parents in enforcing good road behaviours. In particular, Farida Suleymanova, Head of Division for Creativity of the Center for Extracurricular Activities № 46 and Major Isa Deistani, Inspector of the Public Relations Division of the State Traffic Police Department of the Republic of Azerbaijan delivered a strong message to parents on the importance of their active engagement in the road safety education and awareness process.
Also at the event were the directors and deputy directors of each school, the Director of Baku Taxi Services and representatives of the Ministry of Health. Guests were introduced to AMAK’s Road Safety Education project and given an overview of the project’s core activities as well as hearing from Stephen McCormick, Deputy Head of Mission of the British Embassy in Baku, who expressed the Embassy’s aims to support road safety initiatives in Azerbaijan.
The EASST Road Safety Education Pack, supported in Azerbajian by the FIA Foundation, the British Embassy in Baku, the Ministry of Education and the State Traffic Police Department, is a flexible resource for teaching road safety that can be translated and adapted to any local context. It can be used in a variety of settings with simple, fun, educational activities on how children and young people up to the age of 14 can stay safe on the roads. Translated for use in both Azerbaijani and Russian, AMAK has worked with student-volunteers from two of Azerbaijan’s most prestigious universities, ADA University and Qafqaz University, to deliver road safety training to the school children and to guide and support teachers.
