Students from Rotherham College of Arts and Technology have today seen the launch of a series of new road safety videos that have been developed by their fellow students.

The four video clips, developed for use as part of the Drive for Life initiative and aimed at 17-24 year old drivers across South Yorkshire focus on four real life case studies, featuring real people and real families that have been affected by collisions on the roads of South Yorkshire. They also feature Christine Talbot from ITV Calendar News who introduces each clip.

John Richardson, Drive for Life presenter explains: ”Young drivers represent about 7% of the driving population but are involved in approximately 32% of fatal collisions. Drive for Life is a South Yorkshire initiative that takes place at schools and colleges across the county. The event aims to raise awareness of the most important issues of driving and in the last year alone approximately 4,000 students have taken part in the event.

“We’ve run the Drive for Life event for the last four years and whilst we’ve had some excellent feedback we felt that we wanted to add a new section, focusing on road traffic collisions that had happened locally. Because the event is aimed at 17-24 year olds it made sense to get students in that age group to develop the videos as they know the things that are most likely to attract the attention of their peers and make them think about the messages in the videos.

“The students involved in developing the videos have done a great job and i’m sure that the hard work that they have put into this project will help to reinforce road safety messages to all that see the videos. With each death on the road costing an estimated £1.9 million, if these clips save just one life then they will have been successful”.

Ricky Charlesworth, Course tutor at Rotherham College of Arts and Technology has said: “Working with the South Yorkshire Safer Roads Partnership has been a great experience for students on our BTEC National Diploma in Media Production course.

“Working closely with organisations such as the South Yorkshire Police, South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue and the local Councils has allowed students to really focus on an important issue and develop some excellent videos as part of their college coursework.”

Christine Talbot, ITV Calendar News, said: “These videos really bring home the message of how important road safety is. Messages such as always wearing a seat belt, paying attention to the road, the dangers of drink driving and speeding are all covered and it’s great to see that local students have spent so much time and effort in developing these short clips.”

The road safety video initiative has been developed with support from Irwin Mitchell Solicitors and will run as part of Drive for Life events at sixth forms and colleges across South Yorkshire.