This year's Ririe Jr. Miss, Alexis Brown, approached us with a need for help with their "Be Your Best Self" service project. Every year the program undertakes a service project that supports their be your best self platform. This year they heard of a family that lost their senior age daughter to a car wreck one morning before school. The mother, who works at the school, went to look for Alex when she didn't show up for school. She found her several feet from where her pick up had rolled and thrown her out. She had tried to answer a text and lost control. Alex passed away from her injuries. The family now has a foundation (rememberalexbrownfoundation.org ) that allows them to take her truck, on a trailer, to different schools and teach them about texting and driving and distracted driving. They have a pledge for drivers to sign to not text and drive. Along with the pledge they hand out custom thumb bands with the intention that if you go to text and drive and are wearing the band you will remember the pledge and not text. Because of the popularity of the foundation and thumb bands, the Jr. Miss program was unable to get bands from them. Alexis came to our group and asked if we would support their project and help them get bands. We purchased 1000 custom bands. The Jr. Miss program, through Alexis, has worked with our high school to educate students and teachers.
Alexis spoke to the drivers education classes and then set up a booth at lunch. She also encouraged our board to all sign the pledge. We did and wear our thumb bands proudly.
