Berry College is joining forces with the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety to combat alcohol abuse, including underage drinking and impaired driving.

Berry has received an $8,700 grant to participate in the Georgia Young Adult Program. Designed for colleges and universities throughout the state, the Georgia Young Adult Program focuses on peer education in order to promote and bring awareness to highway safety issues including alcohol education, alcohol abuse prevention, impaired driving, underage drinking, safety belts, distractive driving, speeding, risk reductions and other destructive decisions.

The long-term goal of the program is to create safer, more-healthy campus environments. Berry will use this grant to help educate the students at Berry as well as area high schools on the detriments to drinking and driving and other components of alcohol misuse, along with education on the hazards of texting and driving. The grant will be administered by the Campus Police Department.

Berry freshman Alex Sorohan was instrumental in securing the grant, said Maj. Jonathan Baggett, Berry College Assistant Director of Campus Safety. Sorohan, whose brother died in 2009 while texting and driving, works closely with the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety and regularly speaks at conferences. Sorohan will give presentations to Rome area students about the dangers of texting while driving.

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