Road safety officer

Road safety officers encourage the public to become safer road users through education, training, and publicity campaigns. This involves things, such as visiting schools, giving talks to local community groups and arranging exhibitions.

Work activities

Road safety officers work to reduce the number of accidents on the road through education, training, and publicity. Their target is all road users, regardless of age. Road safety officers look into the reasons for accidents, to try to stop them from happening so much in the future. Ways of reducing accidents include:

• Developing road safety educational programmes in schools.
• Giving presentations to community groups.
• Staging exhibitions and publicity campaigns.
• Running or supporting pedestrian training, cycling proficiency and better driving courses.

In their work, road safety officers work with a wide range of people and groups. These include: the police road safety groups schools and playgroups community and voluntary groups. Some road safety officers are responsible for all activities in a particular region. Others may be responsible for a specialist aspect of road safety such as publicity or visiting secondary schools. In both cases, their visits to schools, day centres, county shows and other places involve some local travel.

Personal qualities and skills

The skills you need will partly depend on which area of road safety you go into. In all areas of road safety, you’ll need:

• To be a good communicator able to adapt to speaking in front of different groups.
• Good organisational skills, as your workload can be varied.
• IT skills.
• Knowledge of the law and how it relates to road safety.
• Some teaching and marketing skills.

If you’re working with children, you’ll need:

• Patience.
• The ability to come up with interesting ways of getting the safety message across.

The work suits those who like variety, enjoy meeting people and do not want to be office-bound.

Pay and opportunities

Road safety officers are paid on the local authority scale, which may differ from authority to authority. According to jobs site Glassdoor, pay ranges from £22,000 to £33,000 (based on 8,500 salaries), although trainees may start on less.

They usually work a full-time week. However, attending meetings, providing training courses and staging exhibitions usually involves some evening and/or weekend work.

Demand for road safety officers is steady.

Employers are mainly local authorities – including shire counties, metropolitan boroughs and districts, and London boroughs. Some large companies with transport fleets may also employ road safety officers to reduce accidents among their drivers. Opportunities for road safety officers occur in local authority offices in towns and cities throughout the UK.

Where are vacancies advertised?

Vacancies are advertised on all the major job boards, on the Government’s Find a Job service, and on the LG jobs website.

Entry routes and training

Entry requirements vary a lot between local authorities. School leavers with some GCSEs, or equivalent, can enter directly, usually as a road safety assistant. However, some authorities prefer applicants with A-levels, or equivalent. Some positions may ask that you have a degree or other high-level qualification such as an HND or foundation degree.

Training is on-the-job and is regularly updated. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents runs short courses which contain elements that will be relevant for prospective road safety officers.

Opportunities exist for promotion to senior posts within road safety but may involve moving to a different area or authority.

Rehabilitation of Offenders Act: Jobs that involve working with children, disabled people and the vulnerable are exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. This means that you must supply information to an employer about any spent or unspent convictions, cautions, reprimands or warnings, if they ask you to. This is different from other careers, where you only have to reveal information on unspent convictions if you are asked to.

Qualifications

To become a local authority road safety assistant, the usual minimum requirement is four to five GCSEs at grades 9-4, including English and maths.

However, requirements vary between local authorities and it is common to enter with higher qualifications such as A-levels or a degree and relevant previous experience.

For entry to a degree course in any subject, the usual requirement is:

• Two to three A-levels.
• GCSEs at grades 9-4 in your A-level subjects.
• A further two to three GCSEs at grades 9-4, including English and maths.

Alternatives to A levels include:

• BTEC level 3 qualifications.
• Advanced apprenticeship.
• International Baccalaureate (IB) diploma.

However, entry requirements for different courses vary, so check university prospectuses for more details.

You might also be able to enter this career with an HND, HNC or foundation degree. To enter one of these courses, you will usually need one of the following:

• One A-level.
• A GCSE at grades 9-4 in your A-level subject.
• A further three to four GCSEs at grades 9-4, including English, maths and a science subject.

Alternatives to A-levels include:

• BTEC level 3 qualifications.
• Advanced apprenticeship.
• International Baccalaureate (IB) diploma.

However, entry requirements for different courses vary, so check university prospectuses for more details.

Adult opportunities

Age limits: It is illegal for any organisation to set age limits for entry to employment, education, or training, unless they can show there is a real need to have these limits.

Road safety officers normally have previous relevant experience, for example, in teaching, training, marketing or driving. Working as a road safety assistant while doing part-time study, may lead to entry to officer-level posts.

Courses in road safety are available from various private training providers and are available via distance or flexible learning.

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• Driving examiner
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• School crossing patrol officer
• Teacher