Students in southwestern Alberta ready to PARTY

Youth learn about preventable injuries, dangers of impaired and distracted driving

SOUTH ZONE – Students in southwestern Alberta are gearing up to learn about the dangers of impaired and distracted driving, and how good decisions can help prevent injuries. 

Over the next two months, students from Fort Macleod, Pincher Creek and Crowsnest Pass will join Alberta Health Services health professionals and paramedics, police officers, funeral home operators and injury survivors at hospitals and community events, as part of the Prevent Alcohol and Risk-Related Trauma in Youth (PARTY) program. 

Through interactive, hands-on activities — including mock collisions — students will learn about the dangers of drugs, alcohol, texting while driving, not wearing a seatbelt and speeding. They’ll also learn about the consequences of bad decisions, such as not wearing the appropriate protective gear for sporting and leisure activities.

These sessions are not open to the public. Media interviews can be arranged at the following PARTY program locations:

Fort Macleod – May 16 (8:45 a.m. to 12:15 p.m., FP Walshe High School)

Pincher Creek – May 25 (10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., Matthew Halton High School and Piikani Nation Secondary School)

Crowsnest Pass – June 1 (8:50 a.m. to 11:55 a.m., Crowsnest Consolidated High School and the Livingstone School - Lundbreck) 

The PARTY program began in 1986 at Toronto’s Sunnybrook Health Centre. It was created by a local registered nurse and mother of four daughters, who was living in Port Perry, Ont., where a number of local teens had been seriously injured or killed because of motor vehicle collisions. She and the local hospital administration began inviting teens to the hospital to visit a number of departments, including the trauma room, critical care and rehabilitation wards.

Alberta Health Services is the provincial health authority responsible for planning and delivering health supports and services for more than four million adults and children living in Alberta. Its mission is to provide a patient-focused, quality health system that is accessible and sustainable for all Albertans.

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