Kennesaw State University's Health Promotion and Wellness department has received a more than $22,000 grant to participate in the Georgia Young Adult Program (GYAP) of the Governor's Office of Highway Safety (GOHS). This is the 16th consecutive year that the department in the Division of Student Affairs has received this grant award.

The Georgia GOHS Young Adult Program uses strategies such as peer education, providing educational speakers to schools, and encouraging schools to develop creative, innovative techniques to reduce young adult crashes, injuries and fatalities in their communities.

“The Governor’s Office of Highway Safety is working with all of our highway safety partners to reverse the increase in traffic deaths we have seen in the United States in the last two years, and the goal of this project is to prevent crashes and save lives on our roads,” said Allen Poole, director of the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety. “We ask everyone to join the mission of saving lives on our roads by driving the speed limit, wearing your seat belt, staying off the phone when driving and never driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs.”

The GYAP program at KSU coordinates events and programming such as National Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week, Fall Festival and Safe Spring Break. Funding allows Peer Health Outreach and Wellness Leaders (OWLs) to attend the 2022 NASPA General Assembly Conference; the creation of social norming campaign using data from Kennesaw State University’s 2022 American College Health Association’s National College Health Assessment and promote healthy and responsible choices when it comes to alcohol use and traffic safety issues among students; purchasing of ads for social media outreach for Safe Spring Break, Fall Festival, seatbelt survey results, Wellness on Wheels: Alcohol Awareness, holiday drinking and driving, and other GOHS Impaired Driving campaigns.

The grant award totals $22,378.22 and includes federal funds from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The grant period covers Oct. 1, 2022 to Sept. 30, 2023.