Hilisa Nguyen Case

Lisa Nguyen

Beal

Government/Economics, Period 2

April 10, 2014

Civic Action Report

What problem, issue, or policy did you work on and what did you learn about it?

For our Civic Action Project, Alisya, Lili and I decided to work on the dangers of texting and driving. The issue was that as teenagers, we felt that people in our community and age group specifically do not tend to really realize how dangerous texting while operating a vehicle is. Our goal was to try and raise awareness to this problem. Through our research, we found surprising statistics. It turns out that Researchers estimate more than 3,000 annual teen deaths nationwide from texting and 300,000 injuries. With that being said, it is a very concerning issue. Though putting one's phone to the side is a very simple task, in our generation, it is hard to keep off our phones. People need to realize that something really simple can kill people.

How did you try to impact this problem/issue/policy?

For our actions, we did three things. We first surveyed four classrooms, all with a variety of students who drive and do not drive in the 11th and 12th grade. The purpose was to get an idea of people's opinions on the topic. We found that almost all the students that know texting and driving is a dangerous matter, students still do it anyway. It was really shocking that even when knowing that dangers, people act upon them anyway. The second action we completed was posting flyers around the school parking lot. Our flyers each have the slogan "Don't Drive Intexticated", have a visual image of the consequence, and a phone scan leading to a video of a dangerous accident due to texting and driving. We are hoping this will open the eyes of students. Our last action is bringing a CHP officer to our presentation. He will be telling stories of what his personal experiences were with the topic. This action will give the audience a sense of reality. We want the audience to think "This can happen to me."

What impact did you make?

After posting the flyers in the parking lot, we noticed a lot of people using their phones to scan the scanner. Personally, I observed some shocking faces.