General Motors and In One Instant Promote Teen Driver Safety Through Nationwide Program

DETROIT, Aug. 29, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- In One Instant, a leading teen safe driving program, proudly celebrates over six years of support from General Motors (GM) to educate and empower young drivers across the United States.

This collaboration has helped In One Instant to implement their program in over 4,600 schools nationwide, including 569 schools in communities where GM operates. To date, 871,250 students have successfully completed the program in GM communities, with the ambitious goal of surpassing 1 million students in 2025.

In One Instant's peer-driven program aims to make distracted, reckless, and impaired driving personal and relevant. By engaging teens on an emotional level, they learn how to practice safe driving behaviors behind the wheel and influence their friends and family to do the same. The program's evidence-based approach has been praised by attendees for its impact and effectiveness in creating a culture of safety among young drivers, passengers and pedestrians.

Students who have completed the program have shown significant positive behavioral shifts as evidenced by the personal commitments they have made: 86% won't text and drive; 91% will not drive if impaired; 91% won't get in the car with an impaired driver; 89% will wear seat belts.

"General Motors was one of our first corporate supporters," In One Instant Founder and President Gail Schenbaum said. "Our collaboration over the years has not only educated students in General Motors communities but also fostered a culture of safety within their families and neighborhoods. Together, we have been successful in educating teens about safe driving behaviors to help address what the CDC cites as the #1 cause of unintentional deaths among teens, car crashes."

Students and school administrators across the country have shared their powerful experiences and takeaways from the In One Instant program:

Juan M., a high school Junior from Dallas, Texas reported: "My friends took In One Instant more seriously than pretty much anything. My neighbor was hit by a car driven by a kid who was so high. That message of finding a safe ride home is no joke."

A Grand Rapids, Michigan school principal states: "In One Instant profoundly impacted our students on the importance of the choices they make and how those choices will affect others."

According to Jesse Santiago, an In One Instant Program Guest Speaker: "If I had made a different choice, my best friend would not be paralyzed today. My regrets don't have to be yours. I'm personally asking you to help each other make better, safer driving choices."

Carey M. Wright, former Mississippi State Superintendent of Education said, "In One Instant's success over the last decade in addressing safer teen driving has made a difference in thousands of U.S. schools. Its student-driven activities have been especially impactful and are only one of the reasons why I've recommended the program to every school district in our state. I highly recommend it to all my fellow educators nationwide."

"Safety is at the core of everything we do at GM. Working with nonprofits like In One Instant is helping drive our broader vision of a world with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion," said Alexis Brandl, Transportation Portfolio Lead for Corporate Giving at GM.

By empowering teens to make responsible driving decisions, the program has the potential to improve driving behaviors and help decrease traffic-related incidents, promoting a safe driving environment for everyone.

About In One Instant

In One Instant is a leading national teen safe driving program based in Los Angeles. The interactive, nonprofit program instills lifelong safe driving habits in teens, ultimately reducing traffic-related injuries and fatalities. Drug and alcohol impaired driving is a core component of a forthcoming September event in the state of Wyoming dedicated to Indigenous youth, in coordination with the National Traffic Safety Board (NTSB) and the Wyoming Department of Transportation. Visit: InOneInstant.org

CDC link for more on Risk Factors for Teen Drivers

For press information and for schools interested in implementing this free-of-charge program, please contact Dahlia Greer at [email protected].

SOURCE In One Instant Teen Safe Driving Program