The emotionally-charged “Every 15 Minutes” program returned to Colusa High School, April 27-28, creating a mock drunk-driving-related crash that is as close to reality as possible.
Funded by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety and the California Highway Patrol, the program rotates through Colusa County high schools each year to challenge students to think about the potential consequences if one or more of them are killed or seriously injured in an alcohol-related crash.
On the first day of the program, two Colusa students died, several were injured, and one was arrested and jailed for driving under the influence in a mock presentation.
While the crash was staged in front of school property, students watched as real police officers secured the scene and administered a sobriety test on the suspected drunk driver, portrayed by Justin Lee. Real firefighters and EMTs worked to treat and transport the injured via ground or air ambulance – and they watched as mortuary workers carted away the dead in body bags.
The second day of the program included an assembly, motivational speakers, a mock funeral for for the student performers killed (Ethan Lay and Nicholas Price), and the video presentation of the crash with added “behind the scene” footage at the hospital, where parents received notice that their children were dead because of a drunk driver.
“We try to create a visual of the choices that you make and just how much it affects those around us…how one decision can affect so many people,” said Retired CHP Officer and former Colusa Mayor Pat Landreth, who has been involved with Every 15 Minutes many years.
Colusa’s “Every 15 Minutes” program was presented this year as the senior project of Reese Roper and Holley Hickel, as a way to challenge students to think about personal safety and the responsibility of making mature decisions.
“This program is designed to create an awareness among students that they are not invincible,” Hickel said. “It helps open the emotional doors and give the experience first hand how their actions affect the lives of so many other people.”
More than a dozen students participated in the program as the “living dead,” who were plucked from their classrooms by the Grim Reaper, the scythe-wielding, black-cloaked manifestation of death, and sent to a retreat where they and their parents shared their feelings about the program and wrote obituaries.
Ava Garcia, Danica Chavez, Nathan Garofalo, Elouiza Faris, Luke Kalfsbeek, Carlynn Simmons, Jessica Deniz, Hayden McCarty, Abigail Myers, Briana Pinon, Jaspreet Shoker, Carrere Chase, Juan Carlos Casorla, Clayton Randolph, and Hunter Sines portrayed the ghostly spectors of others killed in alcohol-related car crashes.
“Our goal is to make an impact on our students’ lives, so their parents won’t ever have to go through something like this,” Roper said. “We hope that when a student gets into a situation where drinking and driving is a choice, they won’t get into a car with someone or get behind the wheel.”
The first Every 15 Minutes in California was held for Chico High School in 1995. ■