What we do is have every team member (mentor and student) go through a formal safety training each year. This is where they learn / get refreshed on the basics of PPE (personal protective equipment) and how each tool operates and give a small example of a use case during the build season.
During this time we will ask for a show of hands for who has used this tool before, and if they have any extra tips for safety / operation. We treat our Safety Training Document as a living document and if something is brought up that we didn’t include we will add it for the next training.
Something we always push (pun intended) is paying attention to the direction you are applying force be it utility knives, bandsaws, drills etc… We see that as a fundamental safety item to be mindful of in case your hand slips while using basic shop tools.
Following the safety training we ask if anyone would like to learn how to operate the tools. If we have any takers they will stick around in the shop and get a chance to operate the tool under supervision / guidance while making a measurement, cutting and or drilling a hole.
That is how we cover the safety of general hand and power tools. By this time, the students have already put their names under the sub-teams they are interested in and we can usually get a good sense of who is interested in learning more about our specialty equipment like our Bridgeport, 3D printers and CNC router.
Those students that are interested will then get paired with a couple mentors that are well versed in those tools and will pass on the knowledge of tooling, speeds and feeds, clamping, using the digital readout etc. I am in the process of recording that information into a formal document but for now it has just been word of mouth being passed down.
We’ve recently added a CNC milling machine to our tool collection and will be developing a training course that students will go through so they can learn CAM and machine setup. Given the expense involved with this machine and the risk of crashing it this training will be much more formal and those attending must have learned how to operate the manual milling machine first.
On the topic of job failures we have a pretty good open communication line and observability to the manufacturing sub-team. In training we really push that if something breaks or isn’t working we aren’t going to be mad that you inform us but what will anger us is not knowing about something being broken or needing more material and the deadline is tomorrow.
If something is continuously breaking we will come back to the design team and shop mentors to review what is happening and how we can improve our process to reduce failures.
For important information we make 2D shop drawings for everything we manufacture included in those drawing packets are important info or helpful tips.
TLDR
We take a hands-on approach to training on all the tools, all students and mentors attend the refresher course each year. Every student has the opportunity to learn the tools no matter how many years they’ve been on the team. If they are a veteran student we will often push them to teach the new students and give them the resources needed to do that.
Here is our Safety Training Document
This document’s order is such that it matches the layout of tools in the shop so we can make one loop and cover all the tools. Feel free to use / adapt for your team. Feedback is always appreciated.