For local high school seniors, the next few weeks of proms and graduation ceremonies are a time of celebration, but for parents, school officials and police, it is also the season of worry.
“There are nearly 50 percent more drunk-driving deaths involving teens during the summer months than during any other time of the year,” Washington Regional Alcohol Program President Kurt Gregory Erickson said.
Laura Dawson, the president of the Northern Virginia chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) said she has dreaded the Memorial Day holiday since her teenage son died in an accident eight years ago. Teens are afraid to call their parents and admit they have been in a situation with alcohol, Dawson said.
“I can guarantee that a call for help is a thousand times better than a call from the police department telling you your son is dead,” she said.
MADD, community organizations and D.C.-area schools provide speeches, panels, crashed-car displays and interactive presentations to persuade teens to not drive after drinking. In a 2005 survey of Fairfax County teens, 27 percent had been in a car with someone who had been drinking, and 20 percent said they had driven after drinking, Fairfax Public Schools Prevention Specialist Diane Eckert said.
“These are really fun times for youth and they are so excited, sometimes, that their judgment isn’t as good as it could be,” she said.
Many schools plan all-night prom and graduation after-parties in the hopes of preventing teens from drinking and driving. The parents’ association for Holton Arms, a private high school in Bethesda, is throwing a party at the ESPN Zone after its Saturday prom. T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria prevented students from leaving and returning to the prom intoxicated by refusing admission after 10 p.m., senior class sponsor Madeline Wingate-Alfonso said. The Safe Community Coalition has a campaign called Project Hospitality that educates hotel and limousine associations about the danger of enabling underage drinking, Eckert said.
Interactive presentations, including “drunk goggles,” help teens understand the physical impairment caused by drinking Erickson said.
However, scaring students by putting a wrecked car on campus isn’t always the most effective tactic. Teens respond to the threat of losing their driver’s license, he said.
“I think you’d be pretty hard-pressed to find a 17-year-old in the region that wants their mother to drive them around on a date,” Erickson said.
