Friday, May. 30, 2008

Every 15 Minutes program intense

Last Wednesday and Thursday my family participated in a program at Mansfield High School called "Every 15 Minutes." If you have never heard of it, it is a program for drunken driving awareness. A sad statistic that Texas is not proud of, is the fact that we are second in the nation on alcohol-related deaths.

The Mansfield schools along with 10 other organizations put this program on every two years right before prom and the end of the school year for a reason. I personally want to tell you that this program was extremely intense, and for the 120 students and families that participated, very touching to say the least. There was a mock car crash several of the students were involved in, complete with fire department, police, ambulance, CareFlite, the hospital, funeral home, and even the jail.

Every 15 Minutes (how often someone dies in a alcohol-related crash in the United States) a heartbeat and a flat line sound was heard over the intercom and a student was pulled from their class, their obituary (that their parents had to write) was read. The student was taken away, their face painted white, put in a black T-shirt and returned to class. The student could not speak or be spoken to for the rest of the day. At the same time, there was a police officer and chaplain that came to the home of the student and notified their parents that their child had been killed in an alcohol-related crash.

Later that day all 120 students went to an overnight retreat to an unknown location where they heard many different speakers talk about alcohol awareness. The students had to write a "Last Chance Letter" to their parents as well as the parents had to write one to them on this night they did not come home. The program ended on Thursday morning with a two-hour assembly with everyone united, again filled with tears. Morbid you might say, yes, but it is also reality.

This program has been in the works for six months with countless volunteers from Mansfield school administration, police department, Officer Curtis Phillip, fire department, CareFlite, Blessing Funeral Home, Methodist Hospital, Tarrant County Constable’s Office, P.T.S.A., T.A.B.C., MISD police, steering committee and many more. I wanted to express my appreciation for a job well done by all of the volunteers that worked so hard on this, and hope that it has touched many people in a positive way.

Vince Trebilcock

Mansfield