Chaffee students teaching others about dangers of drunken driving

Eight students from Chaffee High School are taking what they learned during the Show-Me Team Spirit workshop at Drury Lodge this week and turning it into ways to teach other students about the dangers of drunken driving.

The Team Spirit program model was originally used in Dallas in 1989. It was brought to Southeast Missouri by Sharee Galnore and Lynn Ware after they had attended a similar conference in Columbia, Mo.

Except for a $100 school registration fee, the program is funded by the Missouri Department of Transportation and includes meals and lodging. The groups go through team-building exercises and listen to speakers over the course of two-and-a-half days. At each workshop, a speaker told a motivational story and ended the sessions by handing out informational pamphlets.

"They're having so much fun, they don't realize they're learning," said Ware, who along with Galnore is a safe communities coordinator with the Cape Girardeau Police Department.

Pam Holt ended her presentation with "Heaven can wait, buckle up." Holt, a nurse at St. John's Regional Health Center in Springfield, Mo., described being with a dying crash victim at the hospital.

Another speaker, state trooper Dale Moreland, showed students the effect of a crash at 5 mph using a machine called The Convincer, which jolts the person forward causing them to feel the force of the impact.

Brandi Ritter, the Chaffee group's adviser, said she was excited about everything the students had learned and wanted to take back to their friends and peers.

The students intend to carry out an awareness campaign during homecoming to help keep drivers safe on the road. They also plan to make T-shirts, bring in guest speakers and hold memorials for crash victims to reinforce the dangers of drunken driving.

"Just because you're a safe driver doesn't mean that other people are," junior Chyanne Kern said. "I don't see the point" of drunken driving.

Katelyn Hayes, a sophomore, said the retreat has taught her to try to be a safe driver.

"We know a lot of people who drink and drive," Hayes said. "It's something I would never want to do."

She said the students will take the "heartfelt, tearjerking stories" back to Chaffee High School, expressing what they believe is the bottom line about impaired driving: "Drunk people in general make stupid decisions."