SAFETY IN AST 195

The Jefferson Community & Technical College Division of Natural Science requires all students taking laboratory classes to sign a safety release form. The same form is used for all science lab classes. However, the activity in AST 195 generally involves little specific risk. In doing AST 195 lab you might trip over an obstacle on the ground, or drop something on your toe, or stick yourself with a pair of scissors, but you might do those things in the course of any activity, such as assembling a piece of furniture.

Thus, there is no lab manual with a list of safety rules for AST 195 lab. Your instruction in general laboratory safety procedures for AST 195 lab in is as follows: use care and sense as you go about your work in AST 195, as you would in any other activity. One project, however, does involve inherent risks that are particular to that project, and that is the solar observing project. The solar observing project will have specific safety rules that will be addressed at the time of the project. Until that time, your instruction in specific laboratory safety procedures for solar work is as follows: do not aim your telescope at the sun for any reason, and do not look at the sun either with or without the telescope.

Click here for the Division of Natural Science Science Laboratory Safety Release form – all students must read and sign as indicated, and return. Note that students under the age of 18 need a parent/guardian signature as well.