School defends drunken driving hoax

[Gatekeeper]

I wouldn't happen to be addressing a teenager, would I, Wiglaf?

[Riesstiu IV]

Originally posted by Gatekeeper
... what would you have done, considering your words above?

In my area — and, I'm sure, other parts of the nation — law enforcers and school administrators will often tow in a vehicle or two that's been involved in a drunken driving accident and use it as an example of what happens. Or, if they're a bit more creative, they'll try to add a touch of emotional "impact" by having volunteer students take on the roles of dead bodies and bloodied survivors.

All of which is blase to most of today's know-it-all teenagers (an axiom that applies to other generations as well). So, I guess the best teacher is life itself. Perhaps seeing a friend or family dead *for real* is the only way to knock it into a teen who, naturally, thinks s/he is invincible that, no, s/he is quite mortal. Hopefully it never gets to that point, and our otherwise more pedestrian methods of teaching responsibility sinks in. But for some, it won't ... and it'll take a real loss in order for them to realize that.

Gatekeeper

The conundrum is how can you successfully project upon kids that drunk driving is a bad thing when they won't remember the lesson in the moment? When they're drunk, most higher thinking processes go right out the window.

Having a friend die from a drunk driving incident is certainly a good motivator but I imagine the lesson ultimately doesn't have the same impact once they find out they're friends are still alive and forget everything that has happened.

I really don't have much of a solution. In out area, street racing deaths are a much bigger problem compared drinking and driving. The kids around here are spoiled (often receiving high end sedans and sports cars as 16th birthday gifts) and it's a dry county. Our county's problem could easily be solved if parents had enough sense not to give their kids such powerful and expensive vehicles at such an early age.

[Aeson]

Oceanside
School
Beach

[Q Classic]

Originally posted by Will


I'm not sure he needed the lesson if he volunteered to be one of the fake dead.

I'm not sure he didn't need the lesson.

He got to skip class, and he got to be the sadist and see how people reacted to his death.

[SlowwHand]

Re: School defends drunken driving hoax

Originally posted by Grandpa Troll
OCEANSIDE, California (AP) -- On a Monday morning last month, highway patrol officers visited 20 classrooms at El Camino High School to announce some horrible news: Several students had been killed in car wrecks over the weekend.


Oceanside Unified Schools Superintendent Larry Perondi discusses the DUI program as a student looks on.

Classmates wept. Some became hysterical.

A few hours and many tears later, though, the pain turned to fury when the teenagers learned that it was all a hoax, a scared-straight exercise designed by school officials to dramatize the consequences of drinking and driving.

As seniors prepare for graduation parties Friday, school officials in the largely prosperous San Diego, California, suburb are defending themselves against allegations that they went too far.

At school assemblies, some students held posters that read, "Death is real. Don't play with our emotions."

Michelle de Gracia, 16, was in physics class when an officer announced that her missing classmate David, a popular basketball player, had died instantly after being rear-ended by a drunken driver. She said she felt nauseated but was too stunned to cry.

"They got the shock they wanted," she said.

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Some of her classmates became extremely upset, prompting the teacher to tell them immediately that it was all staged.

"People started yelling at the teacher," she said. "It was pretty hectic."

Others, including many who heard the news of the 26 deaths between classes, were left in the dark until the missing students reappeared hours later.

"You feel betrayed by your teachers and administrators, these people you trust," said 15-year-old Carolyn Magos. "But then I felt selfish for feeling that way, because, I mean, if it saves one life, it's worth it."

Officials at the 3,100-student school defended the program.

"They were traumatized, but we wanted them to be traumatized," said guidance counselor Lori Tauber, who helped organize the shocking exercise and got dozens of students to participate. "That's how they get the message."

The plan was to tell the truth to the students at an assembly later in the day. But word that it was all a hoax began to spread before the gathering. Tauber said some counselors and administrators revealed the truth to calm some students who had become upset.

Oceanside Schools Superintendent Larry Perondi said he fielded only a few calls from parents, and the PTA chapter said it had not heard any complaints. Perondi said the program would be revised, but he would not say how. And he said he was glad that students seemed to have gotten the message.

"We did this in earnest," he said. "This was not done to be a prankster."

California is ****ed up, isn't it, DaShi?

[Deity Dude]

I wonder how adults would feel if teenagers went to where they worked and disrupted their day with a hoax story about someone close to them dieing for "their own good"

[Gatekeeper]

Originally posted by Riesstiu IV
The conundrum is how can you successfully project upon kids that drunk driving is a bad thing when they won't remember the lesson in the moment? When they're drunk, most higher thinking processes go right out the window.

Having a friend die from a drunk driving incident is certainly a good motivator but I imagine the lesson ultimately doesn't have the same impact once they find out they're friends are still alive and forget everything that has happened.

I really don't have much of a solution. In out area, street racing deaths are a much bigger problem compared drinking and driving. The kids around here are spoiled (often receiving high end sedans and sports cars as 16th birthday gifts) and it's a dry county. Our county's problem could easily be solved if parents had enough sense not to give their kids such powerful and expensive vehicles at such an early age.

Street racing isn't much of an issue in my area — although one would think the (mostly) flat Great Plains would be ideal for speed demons — so I can't really relate to that aspect.

Nonetheless, I think you hit the nail on the head in your last sentence; namely, the role parents play in their teenagers' lives.

Parents who are an active, positive force in their childrens' lives are to be commended ... so long as it doesn't extend to coddling and protecting them from avoidable mistakes (i.e., protesting a poor test grade for the child, despite the fact that the s/he didn't study for the exam, or was caught cheating).

Gatekeeper

[Wiglaf]

These teenagers should be shot for real this time. Drills are important. They ring the fire alarm when there is no fire and no one complains. Faking killing the students is similar, it is just that these selfish brats apparently are more concerned about their basketball-player crushes than the whole school building full of valuable books and things burning down around them.

Shock lessons are important. These kids for example, will never play with a gun in their life:

[b etor]

am i the only one who thinks that what the teachers and staff did wasn't totally wrong?
i would have loved for that to happen at my high school.

[Patroklos]

Well, seeing as it was a "popular basketball player", had I been in their shoes, I would likely have shed no tear for that loss.

Exactly. If anyone thinks this kid actually volunteered for this your niave. They purposely picked a populare athelete type because if that introverted EMO kid died nobody would have really cared.

Sad really

[Lorizael]

The ****storm brought about by some kid committing suicide over a fake dead friend would have been hilarious and awesome.

But maybe I'm a little insensitive.

[LordShiva]

Teenagers

[Lorizael]

As of 8 am this morning, I no longer have any friends that are teenagers.

[LordShiva]

Murderer

[Felch]

Originally posted by b etor
am i the only one who thinks that what the teachers and staff did wasn't totally wrong?
i would have loved for that to happen at my high school.

I would have loved it happening at my school, but only because I think it's totally wrong.

It would be a sweet senior prank.