Would Grade 12 grads accept a grad party without alcohol?
A small sacrifice for a good friend
Mothers Against Drunk Driving is demanding that Manitoba's 135 high schools make their graduation celebrations completely alcohol-free.
But education officials -- who repeatedly emphasize that safe grad is a parent-run non-school event -- say that's just not realistic.
"MADD will support dry grads, but not safe grads," said Winnipeg chapter president Rod Sudbury, a former police officer.
Sudbury said safe grads, in which parents supervise graduates celebrating in a licensed establishment, and provide transportation, create an unrealistic environment for drinking that the young people will never experience again. He said it encourages young people to break liquor laws by providing alcohol to some grads and guests who are under 18.
"There are schools that have a great celebration, but do it without alcohol," he said, though Sudbury could not name specific schools. "You can have a silent auction, you can have casino games -- do you need alcohol to celebrate?"
"Every year, we encourage people to think about a dry grad," said Keith Thomas, risk manager for the Manitoba Association of School Trustees.
But no school chooses to go completely dry, he said.
"The liquor commission and MAST work very hard to make sure everyone knows the rules," he said.
Before safe grad started in 1981, Thomas said, "We had 30 kids killed on grad nights in the '70s. We haven't had one since" related to a safe grad.
Safe transportation is the key to safe grad, Thomas said. "People like MADD should look more for the benefits."
Sudbury said MADD also fears that some rural high schools don't follow the rules for a safe grad.
Not so, said Thomas. Those schools follow the safe grad rules just as closely as large city schools.
"Swan Valley has an excellent one, same with Roblin -- it's top notch," he said. Even in tiny kindergarten to Grade 12 schools with only five or six graduates, "There may be a party at someone's house; the parents are there.
"My office every year checks with every high school, big or small. We apply the principles of safe transportation to all these events, big or small."
Mountainview School Division superintendent Jack Sullivan said the three Goose Lake High School safe grads he's attended are models for how to run a safe grad.
"We use the curling rink" in Swan River, said Swan Valley School Division superintendent Roy Pike. Parents sign off that they'll pick up their kids or receive them from other parent drivers, even if they're 18 or older, Pike said.
"We've debated and struggled for years to see if we could have a dry grad -- it doesn't work," Pike said. Some students would probably choose to leave a dry grad and drink at a party elsewhere, then drive, Pike said.
Hanover School Division superintendent Ken Klassen said Steinbach grads can attend a dry "farewell" party locally, and a safe grad at the Transcona Country Club that includes transportation to Winnipeg and back to Steinbach.
Even that bash has two separate events. There's a division-sponsored dry banquet, after which students leave the building. They can only go back in for the safe grad if a parent signs them in and agrees to pick them up.
nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca
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