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AT THE SIDEBAR (Column)
It’s Hot Car Awareness Month — Or Something Like That
By J’AMY PACHECO
“I believe that children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way.”
—The Greatest Love of All, Linda Creed & Michael Masser
Have you ever thought about what a child might be able to accomplish with a little encouragement?
In first grade, my daughter attended a school where students changed teachers and classrooms throughout the day. I thought the barely-out-of-kindergartners would end up lost and crying, but they adapted immediately. Within a week, my daughter knew where she needed to be and at what time — something her mom was never able to grasp.
That experience taught me that children are able to do things the rest of us might think are too difficult for them, if they are given a chance.
Fast forward to March, when my daughter, now a fourth grader, had to select a community service project. She chose one that grew out of two earlier science projects: an outreach effort to educate parents about the dangers of leaving children in the car.
To get the word out, she held a poster contest. She wrote to local stores, describing her project and asking if they would donate gift cards for prizes. She received not a single reply.
Undaunted, but too shy to make follow-up telephone calls, she decided to divert money she’d raised recycling cans and bottles from a planned trip to Disney World and buy the gift cards herself.
Realizing that effort would only reach children and their teachers, she wrote to elected officials, again describing her project and asking them to proclaim May “Hot Car Awareness Month or something like that.”
She mailed letters to the chairman of the county Board of Supervisors, Governor Schwarzenegger and President Bush. As of this week, she hasn’t received answers from them, either.
It hasn’t all been that tragic. She got a very nice note from a meteorologist with Golden Gate Weather Services, Jan Null, authorizing her to use information Null compiled on hyperthermia deaths among American children.
There are a lot more of those deaths than you would think. When my daughter started her project in March, 290 children in the U.S. were noted as having died since 1998 from being left in vehicles. By mid-April, another child had died — and it isn’t even summer yet.
This happens, my daughter advised, because the heat in a car rises at alarming rates. It can go up 19 degrees in 10 minutes, and 45 to 50 degrees in one to two hours. A child’s body gets hot three to five times faster than that of an adult. By 104 degrees, a person gets heatstroke. By 107, they die.
A local deejay was kind enough to allow my daughter to discuss her project and announce the poster contest winners on her morning show. (Thank you, Coleen Quinn and Y102!) She asked the local newspaper if they’d take a picture of the poster contest winner, but so far, they haven’t shown any interest, either.
My daughter covered a board with a giant yellow cutout of the sun. Inside it are pictures of happy, healthy, smiling children. Surrounding those pictures are clippings of articles describing the deaths of children left in cars. It made both of us cry.
Every child in the school did a project, from collecting toys for a domestic violence shelter to funding a “school-in-a-box” for earthquake victims. They’re some amazing kids who did some incredible things — mostly projects that are measured in how much money was raised; how many cans were collected.
Unfortunately, my daughter’s project isn’t as easily measured. We know she’s reached at least 200 children, because that’s how many posters she got. We’ll never know how many people heard her on the radio (besides two aunts and some kids from school). In spite of her hard work, she feels she hasn’t been effective — that she hasn’t gotten the word “out there.”
So in an attempt to be at least a little bit helpful, I’m going to print a poem she used as a theme for her poster contest. It goes like this:
“When the sun is shining, your car’s like an oven.
Don’t leave kids and pets in the car if you love ‘em.”
And I’m taking it upon myself to declare the rest of the month “Hot Car Awareness Month or something like that.” Please join me in observing it.
Finally, if you get a letter from a little kid, please take a moment to answer. Because you never know what a child can accomplish, with a little encouragement…
Copyright 2006, Metropolitan News Company