Saturday, April 25, 2009

James Madison University




On Monday, April 13, I had the honor (and it was a TRUE honor) to work with James Madison University's SafeRide program. Dig this... and I'm going to come at this as if you, EE reader, are uninformed about SafeRide since I sure was!

JMU is a campus of approximately 17,000 students, nestled in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. A gorgeous campus near the Blue Ridge Mountains, an incredibly passionate group of students and a true desire to keep JMU students safe from DUI.

The SafeRide program is a 501C3 non-for-profit student run org which provides JMU students with sober rides on Friday and Saturday nights. Several rented cars driven by JMU students are dispatched to different locations when students call into the switchboard. Then, the sober chauffeur shows up, drives intoxicated students home and a threat for a DUI crash is now nill.

The JMU SafeRide program has approximately 200 volunteers who promote, drive, answer phones and, in general, help coordinate the SafeRide program. In the last several years since the initiation of SafeRide, over 10,000 safe rides have been given to JMU students. Think of that for a second...10,000 intoxicated drivers taken off the road. Not by the cops, not by the legal system, but by passionate students who simply want to see their friends arrive alive. Major props to the JMU SafeRide program for such fantastic work!

And special thanks to all my travelling companions who ran me back and forth to Charlottesville! Extra special thanks to Jamie Koslosky for being such an incredible client to work with! Thanks again, JMU! You guys rock!

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