Fargo Red River Program Highlights For October

The schools involved are: Aggassiz Junior High School, Ben Franklin Junior High School, Discover Junior High School, Oak Grove High School and Shanley high School. Dan Schoonhoven and Dean Bloch have met weekly with different school groups to organize the campaign. Students at all schools have completed baseline surveys, which have been tallied. A "soft promotion" with safety belt posters at each school and daily announcements over the intercom or on hall monitors has begun. The announcements include safety belt facts from 1999 and 2000, and two safety belt slogans: Arrive alive . . . buckle up, and Buckle In or Get Out. Safety belt trinket booklets have been distributed and the group at each school is deciding which incentives to purchase. Students have made thermometer-style safety belt graphs to show the results of the surveys. Safety belt questionnaires have been distributed to all students in each school during English class and results are being tallied. The second safety belt survey is in planning. Dan states that so far the program has been fun and quite time-intensive. The students are fun to work with and teacher comments have been very positive.