Dear Parents,
Today we hosted an ICBC Road Safety Speaker to speak to the Grade 10-12 students regarding the impacts of distracted, impaired, or unsafe driving. We have welcomed these speakers to our school each spring for many years at MRCS and have found their presentations to be thoughtful, engaging, and impactful.
ICBC sponsors these important Road Safety talks for schools each spring because drivers between 16 and 21 are over-represented in crashes that result in injuries or fatalities, and they especially seem to increase at this time of year. Their studies indicate that young drivers are over represented in these crashes as a result of speeding, impaired driving, and distracted driving.
Today’s speaker was one who has been a paramedic in the Surrey area for 35 years. His presentation was very impactful and valuable, but also quite intense as he shared stories of his experiences in the field. We did not realize quite how intense the discussion would be, and, while students were told up front before the talk started that they could leave if they felt it would impact them negatively, we realize that knowing the intense nature of the discussion would have had some families choosing to have their child not attend the presentation.
We did follow up with the few students who stepped out for a moment during the presentation to ensure they felt okay, but we wanted you to be aware of this presentation as parents, so that you can follow up with your child at home regarding the content and their overall reaction to the speaker. We will connect with ICBC and ask them to ensure that this speaker comes with a notice of the intense nature of his presentation.
We appreciate this speaker coming to share his story with our students and to help them see the realities of the impacts of unsafe driving. He shared not only the importance of making smart driving decisions, but also the importance of caring for one’s mental health by asking for help if needed and caring for one’s loved ones by helping them make smart driving decisions. He is passionate about working with youth to help them make positive choices from the start, and his passion and care also was evident in his discussion.
Sincerely,
Stacy Sowerby
Acting Assistant Principal K-12