Schools resume height based activities but at lower capacity after two year suspension

About 80 Gan Eng Seng School students took turns on a zipline, abseil station, climbing wall and tower circuit for the first time since a fatal incident involving a rope course in 2021

SINGAPORE: Schools in Singapore on Tuesday (Feb 1) resumed height-based activities but at a lower capacity, following a near two-year suspension prompted by a fatal incident during a camp programme.

At the Jalan Bahtera Outdoor Adventure Learning Centre, activities like the zipline, abseil station, climbing wall and tower circuit operated at 50 per cent or less of normal capacity, with more time allocated for students to participate in each activity

This also means that instructors will work with fewer students than usual.

This reduced tempo will be in place at all activity sites until Mar 31, to provide time for instructors to ease into their roles safely, said the Ministry of Education (MOE) on Tuesday. 

Gan Eng Seng School student Bao-Anh Nguyen, 15, said she had been looking forward to the activities. 

“I wasn’t scared, but more like excited … because since we’re in Sec 3, we’re in a new class and we need to get to know our classmates,” she said, after tackling the tower circuit.

The Secondary 3 students were at Jalan Bahtera for a three-day camp. About 30 per cent of the cohort, or 80 students, got to try out the height-based activities for the first time since they were suspended in February 2021 - after a 15-year-old student died during a rope course at SAFRA Yishun.

“I think the instructors’ guidance was very reassuring to us because they made us trust them and they were there for us,” Bao-Anh said. 

“And I think we feel very safe also because they are very adamant about our equipment being very correct, our helmets put on properly and our harnesses also.”

She said that they were checked at least three to four times before starting their runs. 

Each class was split into two groups of 20 students, with one mentor attached to each group.

Aside from mentors and instructors, teachers will be onsite to look after students, with appointed school personnel executing incident and emergency plans when needed, MOE said.

Instructors are responsible for setting up and conducting the height-based activities, and safety supervisors are in charge of the overall safety conduct of activities, as well as managing rescue and evacuation situations. 

After carrying out an internal review of the safety of height-based activities, MOE now requires all operators offering such activities for MOE students to be regularly accredited by a National Sports Association or a regional outdoor adventure learning professional body. 

Schools must also engage only accredited operators and qualified instructors to conduct the activities. Instructors must have skills and training based on the Association for Challenge Course Technology (ACCT) standards. 

For example, only instructors who have a Level 2 certification with ACCT or Outward Bound Singapore can be safety supervisors. 

Facilities and equipment at MOE adventure learning centres should also be checked and inspected monthly and maintained every quarter by ACCT-accredited professionals.

The four MOE adventure learning centres, as well as two Outward Bound Singapore sites, now have the required accreditation, said master outdoor adventure educator Kuang Yoke Wee. 

“During the hiatus, we spent a lot of time with instructors. We had regular refresher sessions, and just before we resumed, we conducted a few sessions of skills verifications … They all spent one full day just going through all the dispatches, safety briefings, management, rescue practices,” he added. 

Instructors now also need to take on more accountability and sign off on forms when they have checked the equipment and facilities, said Mr Kuang. 

For example, instructors now have a checklist to go through before they issue equipment to students, which spells out exactly what they need to look for, he added. 

The lowered operating capacity also allows instructors to ease back into the job with these enhanced safety measures, said Mr Kuang. 

“We have the consideration that challenge course instructors have been off this work for so many months. So we just want to make sure everybody gets back on track with the correct understanding.”

Source: CNA/hw(jo)