Junior Jordyn Smith and sophomore Connor O’Brien are heading the committee that is in charge of the Don’t Text and Drive campaign as part of their work in student government.

     The committee is designed to reach out to students and inform them about how negative texting and driving is and how it is affecting the community.

     “I hope that the new committee will open up the eyes of students and show them how fast things change from good to bad,” said O’Brien.

     The committee has planned a week long campaign to raise awareness which will take place in late February. There will be pledge forms, thumb-bands and a possibility of thumbprints.

     “The thumb-bands will have the slogan ‘DNT TXT N DRV’,” said O’Brien. “They will be orange with black writing.”

     The campaign is still in the planning stage and will include an assembly on February 23 when Roseville Youth Officer Carlos Cortez will give personal, first-hand experience on real-life crashes caused by texting behind the wheel and how much they affected the community. Cortez will also go over the consequences of texting and driving.

     “We are trying to prevent these accidents more than anything because people don’t realize the dangers of texting and driving,” said Cortez.

     According to Cortez, it’s difficult to ticket drivers for using their phones behind the wheel.

     “People are always trying to get out of cell phone fines,” said Cortez. “I always get funny excuses.”

      California law prohibits the handheld use of electronics while driving. Everything placed next to the ear, even if the device is not a cell phone, is considered illegal.

     “Even I, an experienced driver, sometimes catch myself drifting off while answering a duty call,” said Cortez. “The problem is that teens are less experienced and are distracted more easily.”

     The committee is modeled from actions by a community where a fatal crash involving texting occurred.

     “We started the campaign because of watching an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” said Smith.

     The episode was about a family whose daughter, Alex Brown, died on her way to school because of texting and driving.

     After the accident Brown’s mother founded the Alex Brown foundation. The focus of the foundation is reaching out to local Texas schools through assemblies. The assembly concept was incorporated into Roseville High School’s campaign.

     “The format of the committee is coming from the Brown story,” said O’Brien. “But then we are adding our own ideas to make it fit RHS.”