THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, June 1, 1995 TAG: 9505270169
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 13 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOAN C. STANUS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
At first, they ran out of film.
Then, the camera broke.
Finally, they forgot to buckle their seat belts.
But after three ``shaky'' takes, five students in the Youth Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Program at Granby High School put together an award-winning public service announcement on seat-belt safety that won them $500.
The video contest was sponsored by WAVY-TV and Drive Smart Hampton Roads, a community traffic safety program organized by the U.S. Automobile Association. Some 76 students in Hampton Roads participated in the contest, which targeted safety belt use as its topic. The Granby students took first place among the Norfolk schools.
``We were very surprised'' at winning, said Shauna Briggs, a 17-year-old Granby junior. ``We figured it was last minute, and we rushed to finish it. We really didn't have enough time to do it like we wanted.''
Briggs and four friends decided to tackle the minute-long public service announcement after their club sponsor, teacher Pat Wilson, told them about it, just a day before the deadline.
Senior Jermaine Capen, an experienced actor, came up with a plot idea rather quickly. The plot revolves around a bunch of friends who climb into a car on their way home from a party. One of the girls, played by Briggs, doesn't want to buckle her seat beat. Everyone else gives her a hard time about it, and the driver refuses to move the car until she is safely secured. Eventually, she succumbs to the peer pressure and buckles up.
``I was in this same situation once,'' Capen explained. ``It happened to me
In addition to Briggs and Capen, the other Granby students who participated in making the video were Nicole Jackson, Jerri Everette and Anthony King.
With the winnings, the students plan on treating the rest of the YADAPP club members to a day at Kings Dominion and using the rest of the money in the club's community projects for next year.
About 13 Granby students are involved in the club, which is dedicated to providing teens with information and alternative opportunities to drug and alcohol use. In addition to making public service announcements, the students visit Norfolk elementary and middle schools each month, where they serve as teen mentors and present puppet shows on self-esteem and drug abuse. They've also taken active roles in the Norfolk police department's DARE program, the Great American Smokeout and the national Red Ribbon Week that focuses on drug and alcohol use. At Granby, the students sponsor the ``Just Say No Games'' each year and present multimedia shows with inspirational messages at school assemblies.
``There's a real problem in our society with drug and alcohol abuse, and we're trying to do our best to show the public and high school students there's other things to do besides drugs and alcohol,'' said Emmanuel Geth, a 17-year-old senior in the club. ``The video was just one way to do that.''
In addition to Granby, other first-place winners in the Drive Smart video contest were First Colonial High School in Virginia Beach, Churchland High School in Portsmouth, Great Bridge High School in Chesapeake and Nansemond Suffolk Academy in Suffolk.
In Norfolk, a second-place award went to Norfolk Collegiate students, and third-place honors went to those at Norfolk Academy. Another group of students from Granby also earned an honorable mention.
In all, area high school students won about $3,700 for their winning videos. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by RICHARD L. DUNSTON
From left, Shauna Briggs, Anthony King and Jermaine Capen helped put
together an award-winning video.
by CNB