BROCKWAY, Pa. (EYT) – With prom coming at the end of the week, juniors and seniors at Brockway Area Junior-Senior High School got a vivid reminder of how bad choices can had consequences.
The school district partnered with the police department, ambulance service, and the fire department to put on a mock accident.
Brockway Police Chief Terry Young kicked off the event by saying that DUIs lead the crimes in Pennsylvania. He went over different rules related to DUIs and gave students a laminated handout with traffic laws.
“Look to your left, look to your right: odds are, someone is going to die sometime due to alcohol,” Young said. “When I was your age, they said the same thing. I looked at my friend, not expecting anything. A year later, he was killed in a DUI.”
Brockway students enact a mock accident to warn fellow students about drunk driving.
The chief made sure students knew the legal limits for them. He said that they need to pay attention because this is something that kills young people every day, with prom coming up, parties can take a really bad turn.
“Please take this seriously,” he said. “The odds are, someone in this class will drive drunk one day. Car crashes are the leading cause of death for teens. Drunk driving accounts for a quarter of them.”
Young took the students outside where the mock accident was set up. Brockway Ambulance and the fire department assisted in the drill. Two vehicles, a minivan and an SUV, were arranged as though the van cut in front of the other vehicle. Brockway seniors Santino Inzana and Madison Barefield played dead while classmate Garrett McClintick acted as though he were the drunk driver who caused the accident. The fire department responded from around the corner, mimicking an actual call. McClintick was “arrested” for DUI.
McClintick, Barefield, and Inzana got high praise from their classmates. The other students were impressed with how realistic the students made the crash scene.
“I thought it was eye-opening,” Brockway junior Justice Williams said. “Some people take it as a joke, but seeing that may have convinced them. I hear about that stuff to begin with, but to see it — to see the sirens, the body bags, that was intense.”
“I would be sad to see those kids in a car crash,” Taylor Little, another junior, said. “It gave me chills. It was intense. The actors were really good. I think we need to do things like this more often so people can visualize it. I feel like this and the Reality Tour makes you think twice about parties and what you’re doing.”
“It was something we should do again,” classmate Elijah Snell said. “Seeing them cover up Madison’s body, that’s when the seriousness hit me.”
Brockway co-principal Mark Dippold said that he hopes that students take this message to heart when prom comes around.
“It is a reminder to students of the dangers of drinking and driving,” he said. “This scenario gives them a very realistic look at what could happen if they make bad decisions.”
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