SAFE, Seat Belts Are For Everyone, will be hosting a two day project at Maize to promote putting an end to texting and driving among teens starting on Wednesday.

“The editor of Teen View Magazine asked us if we would want to do this certain activity,” SAFE sponsor Dana Desjardins said. “They came up with this idea of someone dressed as the grim reaper, but we didn’t want to freak people out, so, starting on Wednesday and Thursday, we’ll start pulling kids out of class to participate.”

Once a student is pulled from class for the project, they’re considered dead due to a texting and driving accident. From then on, the student has lost all privilege to speak to his or her friends for the remainder of the school day.

“Every 15 minutes a kid dies from an accident, and it’s totally unavoidable,” Desjardins said. “That’s 24 students that die from 7:40 in the morning to 2:45 in the afternoon every day.”

Sophomore Alicia Massie has been a part of the SAFE squad since her freshman year and is looking forward to the project.

“I’m personally super excited about it, I get to participate in it which it makes it a lot more fun,” Massie said.

SAFE puts on promotional activities around the school whenever they can. Next week will be dedicated to SAFE and their efforts to prevent teen texting and driving and other unsafe practices.

“We had SAFE week last year,” Desjardins said. “It went so wonderful that Dr. Botts said that we could do it again this year. We’ll do ‘Burritos for belts’, ‘Donut forget your seat belts’ as well. You wear your seat belt and you get a free donut. Finally, we’re going to do ‘Don’t drive fried,’ and you can buy Chick-Fil-A on Friday during lunch.”

Students are encouraged to sign up to participate in these upcoming events in the nurse’s office.

“We want to educate students because you guys are our leaders,” Desjardins said. “We need you guys to be safe and smart.”