Drive 2 Stay Alive

Issue: Driver Safety

Grant Amount: $82,216.06
Eureka, CA
Year Funded: 2011
Organization: Eureka Senior High School

Contact Information

Eureka High EAST Lab
1915 J Street
Eureka, CA 95501
(707) 476-1632
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Under the leadership of students from Eureka High School, Drive 2 Stay Alive is a coordinated effort to create a coalition of schools, governmental agencies, State Farm agents, and law enforcement working together to educate young drivers about realities of dangerous choices behind the wheel. In order to achieve project goals: partner schools will integrate their message into the schools’ curriculum, the coalition will host drive safe drive smart events focused on teaching the elements of safe driving to both students and their parents. The coalition will utilize television, radio, print media, and social media to actively convey their message. While Drive 2 Stay Alive has been recognized as a national leading project by State Farm Insurance and the National Youth Leadership Council (NYLC) for its achievements in promoting awareness about teen driver safety at Eureka High School, student leaders aim to build upon their success and impact the entire North Coast of California.

Our project is a teen driver safety program that focuses on ‘Driver Safety’ by presenting the consequences of distracted and/or impaired driving and how driving while distracted or impaired can have the potential to negatively affect the whole community. As a national leading school for Project Ignition, ‘Drive 2 Stay Alive’ will be working with schools throughout the state of California and with other states to promote the attitude of safe driving. In order to surmount the issue of unsafe driving behavior in our area, we are currently in the process of creating a safe teen driving coalition with high schools in our county.

Project Updates

Check Presentation Ceremony

After receiving the news that our grant request was approved, we invited the many community partners that have supported Drive 2 Stay Alive over the years to attend our check presentation ceremony. We thank the following for their support for our project: State Farm Insurance, California Highway Patrol, Eureka Police Department, Eureka City Council, Humboldt County Board of Supervisors, Humboldt County Dept. of Health & Human Services - Public Health Branch, Eureka City Schools/Eureka Senior High School, and the State Farm Youth Advisory Board!

Eureka High "Chalk On the Walk"

During Homecoming Week at Eureka High, members of the Drive 2 Stay Alive team participated in annual "Chalk On the Walk" event. "Chalk on the Walk" encourages school clubs, projects, sports, and academic departments to create a chalk design that represents their theme on Eureka High's Quad area, the "Eureka High Main Street."

Every 15 Minutes -- First Meeting

The student directors of the Every 15 Minutes program at Eureka High School held their first planning meeting on October 16, 2011. Every 15 Minutes will work in coordination with Drive 2 Stay Alive to demonstrate to the students on our campus about the dangers of distracted and impaired driving. We would like to thank those agencies that participated in this meeting: Eureka Police Dept., Eureka Fire Dept., Superior Court of Humboldt County, California Highway Patrol, Eureka Senior High School, and Access Humboldt, a local non-profit, public service media production organization. The next planning meeting will be held in mid-December.

National Teen Driver Safety Week

During National Teen Driver Safety Week (Oct. 16 - 22, 2011), Drive 2 Stay Alive was the host of many activities related to teen driver safety. A "Question of the Day" was posted around campus and on our school's online bulletin every day. The question, relating to teen driver safety, prompted students to answer the question in the hopes of receiving a prize. We also presented to the Health & Safety classes about teen driver safety (which just so happened to be during their driving unit). Of course, the most engaging activity that we conducted during the week was our first ever "Seatbelt Relay." In the relay, teams of three donned Fatal Vision goggles (commonly referred to as "drunk goggles"), navigated through a course of traffic cones, and tried to be the first team to have all of its members "buckle-up" in the shortest amount of time. This activity was so successful that we have decided to work with Student Government to incorporate the "Seatbelt Relay" in more school rallies.

Teen Driving Summit

This year, we have planned to create a safe driving network with the high schools in Humboldt County that will work with our project to effectively convey the message of safe driving to teens. On November 2, 2011, the Drive 2 Stay Alive team made our first major stride in fulfilling the goal we set forth for our project: we hosted a Teen Driving Summit at Eureka High School. We invited five of the major public high schools in Humboldt County--Arcata, McKinleyville, Fortuna, Ferndale, and Hoopa Valley High Schools--as well as the private secondary school in Eureka--St. Bernard's Catholic School--to attend the summit. We provided the schools with resources, materials, guidance, and assistance so that they can create a safe driving program on their campuses and so that they can work with our project to create the most impact for our region. This summit established these schools as long-standing partners for our project.

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