Safe and Sober Grad Night needs your support nowSafe and Sober Grad Night needs your support nowJanuary 10, 2003
If one of your New Year's resolutions is to help children this year, whether your own or others, why not consider purchasing one of Freedom High School's Safe and Sober Grad Night raffle tickets. The results may save a life come graduation night for more than 300 seniors.
Statistics show that before graduation night is over, a good number of graduating seniors throughout the country will head out to some sort of celebration with their friends. Statistics also show that graduation night is when the most teenage fatalities occur.
Despite all of the talk of designated drivers and declining numbers of under-age drinking, all bets are off on this day. Because of that, seven years ago a group of concerned Freedom High School parents decided to take the lead from other high schools throughout the country and host a Grad Night Celebration. This good deed cannot be accomplished without funding. A different group of parents is working on the committee this year, but nonetheless they need your help just as much.
The group started this raffle as a way to raise funds. Each ticket costs $20. For that the winner will receive $1,000, but think past the chance the win a prize to an opportunity to save a life. If it isn't a child's life it might be your own if you are out on the road that night. The celebration is also teaching young adults the responsibility that comes with drinking and driving. When you think about it, what better lesson can these students learn than the effort that the adults make to give them an evening of safety?
The idea behind the celebration, according to the committee, is to give seniors an alternative to heading out to find their own parties, where they could possibly get drunk and drive. Grad Night opens its doors at 9 p.m. on graduation night in the Freedom High School quad. Then the real party begins. Grad Night participants stay at the school until 5 a.m. the next morning. Students cannot leave the school once they enter unless they have permission from their parents.
Many of the students aren't even 18 yet. The adult volunteers are responsible for them and they take that seriously. If the students want to leave, their parents are called.
Tickets for the evening events are $40 in advance and $50 at the door. Not such a high price to know that the children will be kept safe for the evening. "Scholarships" are also available. But the ticket price doesn't really begin to pay the expense that is incurred to keep the teens entertained for the whole night.
So what will keep 300 to 400 seniors locked up in the school quad area for an entire night? Last year it was an all-night barbecue, laser tag, bumper cars, mountain bike tricycle races, a deejay, magicians, casino, hypnotist, arcade, theme rooms, and a raffle that is conducted at the end of the evening where the ticket holders must be present to win. There was also a concert featuring a popular local rock band.
This year's committee is in need of 200 volunteers to work the night of the event. It is not necessary for the adult volunteers to be parents of a graduating high school senior.
The committee has made an effort to sell tickets this year by sitting out in the cold rainy weather in front of Raley's, which is where I purchased my ticket. This past week volunteers manned phones calling everyone possible and asking them to purchase a ticket. Those who agreed to purchase a ticket were asked if they could have someone bring one right over for purchase. This has been a successful means of selling tickets.
The committee will be selling tickets until Monday evening when they will hold the raffle drawing. You need not be present to win. In the meantime tickets are still for sale. They can be purchased this weekend at Video Cinema in the Centromart Plaza.
Roni Gehlke's column on life in Oakley appears each week in the Brentwood News.
Distributed by the Contra Costa Times