My name is Sam Senser, and I am the 2015 Project Yellow Light scholarship winner. It was the spring of 2014 when I, my friend Jake, and my brother Wrenn created the PSA that would eventually take me all the way to New York City. It was an experience I’ll never forget.
While winning prizes and getting to see places I’ve never been is fun, the biggest reward and the most important part of the whole experience is getting the message out. Since creating the video, I have seen myself, my family, and my friends, all drive less distracted. I have become much more aware of the dangers of distracted driving and have heard many stories of loved ones lost. It really is quite a big issue today with all the technology and how much you can do on your phone. You don’t only endanger your own life, but everyone else on the road with you.
One statistic always comes to mind: the average text can take your eyes off the road for five seconds. Think about how far you can travel in a car in five seconds. What we tried to do in the ‘It’s Not Safe For Anyone…’ PSA was to try to make it memorable. If you can get someone to laugh at a commercial they always tend to remember it better, and that is what we intended to do when we set out to make our commercial on distracted driving.
I’m a video guy, and that’s all I do. That’s really all I’ve ever done. I’ve made short films, commercials, promotional corporate work, and personal projects just for fun. A lot of the stuff that I do is just for fun, to show friends and family. But getting to make a video to advance a great cause and help to save lives makes it much, much more worth while. It adds a lot of value, using the power of film to help create awareness. And, of course, having the opportunity to have your work shown to many thousands of people nation wide is an amazing feeling. The more people you can reach, the better.
Winning the Project Yellow Light scholarship has been an incredibly fun journey, and just being involved in the process of helping to create safer roads has certainly helped my own driving, as well as my family’s. I am proud to have been a part of it all, and I hope our video can reach out and help to save lives, and make driving a much safer activity.
Do you have any tips for driving safety? Let us know in the comments below, and for more distracted driving stories, check them out here. You can also learn more on Project Yellow Light Scholarship!
