Lake Washington Students Launch Campaign Against Texting While Driving

Names: High school seniors Shannon Bebee (18), Kaylin Wilson (17) and Taylor LeFave (18).

School, neighborhood: Lake Washington High School, Rose Hill

Accomplishment: Raising awareness of the deadly implications of texting while driving through a Distributive Education Clubs of America (DECA) public relations campaign.

Key to awesomeness:

While these three teens are eagerly awaiting graduation and college acceptance letters, they are also gearing up for a state-level competition. The high school program DECA is designed to teach students about business and will be hosting the state conference competition beginning March 3.

The girls chose to compete in the public relations campaign event and came across heathersstory.org, a website born of a local tragedy. Heather Lerch, an otherwise responsible 19-year old from Littlerock, Wash., who was attending Centralia College, died instantly in a car wreck just one year ago because she decided to text a friend while driving.

"We immediately felt a personal connection because she was a local teen so similar in age to both ourselves and our peers," says Bebee. "We began to look more deeply into the dangers of texting while driving and were shocked to discover the alarming statistics."

She went on to compare the increased risk of a car accident while driving drunk versus driving and texting versus driving while not impaired. "You're four times as likely to wreck while drunk, but eight times as likely to wreck when texting."

The girls are well-aware of the difficult process of getting other teens' attention. "Teens don't really want to take their parents' advice," says Wilson.

"We felt that if we could spread our message at a peer-to-peer level, perhaps students would take this issue to heart," explains Bebee.

The school has been more than happy to promote their campaign, which includes an essay and video, by giving the girls the freedom to put up posters on campus, talk to students during lunches and broadcast the message through the journalism class.

Trooper Julie Startup of the Washington State Patrol delivered Lerch's smashed Chevrolet Cobalt to Lake Washington High School's main entrance Tuesday, Feb. 22. It will be on display through Friday, Feb. 25.

"The response has been pretty amazing," says Bebee. "Kids saw the footage in the lunch room and then ran out front to see the real thing. And all the parents who pick up their kids have to drive by it."

There is a short video on the heathersstory.org site showing Lerch's last words.

Hey you and I need to hang sometime :-) alright cool :-)

"The conversation was not worth her life," comment Lerch's parents on the site.

On Friday, Bebee, Wilson and LeFave will be handing out Smarties candies with alarming statistics and the message "Be a Smartie" as part of their multifaceted project. They will also be urging students to sigh Oprah Winfrey's "No Phone Zone" pledge in an effort to prolong young lives that have really just begun.