The Health and Safety Authority (HSA) has invited third level students on construction-related courses to participate in its annual 'Safety in Design' competition.

The prizes include €3,000 for the winning team and €1,000 for finalist teams. The competition involves setting up a Design Build Team from different disciplines, to plan and complete safety and health tasks based on a given scenario.

The deadline for submitting application forms to register teams is 12th October 2011. For further information on the competition and to download the application form, see www.hsa.ie/education. The grand final will be held in early February 2012. Teams must be made up of three members from more than one construction-related discipline and students must be currently enrolled on a full-time or part-time basis on a construction-related undergraduate programme.

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Chairperson of the Third Level Group of the HSA, Dr. Anne Drummond said: "We're delighted to launch the competition again this year. Getting students from different backgrounds working together to manage safety and health is what construction professionals do in real-life.

Lecturers can get involved by encouraging class groups from different disciplines to enter and the competition lends itself well to on-going course work."

HSA Education Manager, Joanne Harmon said: "This year, the Authority will publish the top three submissions in full on the HSA website and finalists’ projects will be displayed at the grand final for an industry audience. We will make feedback available to teams and their lecturers on all submissions so that students can improve their learning from the experience and take it to their workplaces in the future."

The competition is sponsored by the Construction Advisory Committee and the Third Level Group of the Health and Safety Authority.

(CD/BMcC)