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‘Drive To Survive’: West Michigan Students Get Behind The Wheel

Posted at 6:31 PM, Oct 18, 2013
and last updated 2013-10-18 18:31:33-04

HOLLAND, Mich.,–Statistics show car accidents are the leading cause of death among teenagers and in effort to try to reverse those numbers, West Michigan students are being tested during some dangerous scenarios that are very real.

The conference was held Friday in Holland; it was hosted by Ionia ISD, the Holland Public Safety Department and Holland Police ‘Racing Through Education’ Program.

The students had the opportunity to try hands-on driving simulators for distracted driving along with drunken driving scenarios. After going through many of the real life situations the kids walked away in utter shock.

Law enforcement and educators on hand to talk with the students are just hoping it will serve as a reminder, one they won’t forget once they get back on the road.

Billy Miller from Lakeview who went through the drunken driving course says he couldn’t believe that people actually drive drunk.  “I wouldn’t want to do it and I wouldn’t want any of my friends to do it either.”

Katie Bush tried her hand at the distracted driving course; “It was defiantly an eye opener, it just takes two seconds and your across the double yellow and putting everybody else in danger,” she said.

Bush says it was very eye-opening and severed as a reminder that these things can really happen. “It’s not just something that happens to other people. That’s something teenagers think that it doesn’t happen to them but it will.”