finding legal stuffs

[dman11235]

Okay, so, for a school project I need to attach legal documents about safety in the science classroom.  But my googlefu has failed me, and I cannot, even on the DOJ site, gain access to the actual full laws regarding this stuff.  Anyone help me find where they stick the full laws?

[altpersona]

i doubt 'law' applies much, id check osha

[dman11235]

It works if it's an actual law or something from them, I just couldn't find anything.  But, my mom came through and found something useful.  I'd like some more advice on how to actually find the laws in the future though.

[bhu]

What state are you in?  Are you talking about MSDS for this project?

[dman11235]

No, I can find those.  I did need them, but Flinn has pretty much every MSDS known to man, and it's easily searchable.  They don't have steel wool for some reason, but they do have water!  And glass wool....

Indiana, and I needed actual laws and statutes.  Like, the things that congress passes and the governor/president signs into law.  The actual text of those.  They /should/ be freely available and searchable, but I can't find them.

[Frogman55]

The CDC released School Chem lab guidelines, though those are general guidelines, rather than law. (You can find yourself with civil liability following an accident and you don't follow industry standard guidelines, but it's not really law).

Indiana State Code is here, Title 20, Article 34 covers student health and safety; 20-34-3-19 talks about eye protection.

Title 22 is the Indiana State Law governing Labor and Safety, A quick glance at Article 8 makes it appear that they do enforce OSHA standards, though they may be stronger than OSHA in places and I don't really feel like reading all of Article 8 at the moment. It is also possible that individual school districts may have stronger regulations in place.

OSHA is going to regulate most safety stuff, you can find a database here. They'll cover lots of general rules about walking surfaces, protective gear, ventilation, hazardous materials, etc. It is probably safe to assume that they have the same standards for educational labs that they have for commercial labs, but it could potentially be different. Again, I don't feel like doing a case survey to see if Indiana applies OSHA standards in schools.

[dman11235]

Yeah, my problem was that I was finding official guidelines and whatnot when I needed the laws that created the guidelines.  That second link?  That's what I needed.

And IN does follow OSHA standards...mostly I think?  I think if there's something different it's really minor.  That is, the difference is minor or the issue is minor.

[Frogman55]

Yeah, my problem was that I was finding official guidelines and whatnot when I needed the laws that created the guidelines.  That second link?  That's what I needed.

And IN does follow OSHA standards...mostly I think?  I think if there's something different it's really minor.  That is, the difference is minor or the issue is minor.

I think that part of your problem here is that OSHA guidelines are the law. Or, rather, that IN enforces the guidelines as law. The only thing I'd feel uncertain about is whether or not student safety is synonymous with worker safety. I suppose that safety violations threaten teachers as much as students so.... 

[dman11235]

Let me clue you in on something about Indiana government and education: everyone here sucks.  Almost as bad as Ohio (hi bhu!).  The governor set up a secret council of unelected friends and businessmen from his party so he could bypass the elected state superintendent.  And do what he wants.  Like promote the charter schools that pay his party for the mention and political favors.  And fudge their grades so they appear to be better schools than they are (they are for-profit schools btw).  Yeah, that's Indiana education!