Good afternoon.
My name is Cindy Speaker, and I'm delighted today to have a special guest.
Her name is Alyson Neaves, and Alyson is the- Hi.
Hi, Alyson.
Alyson is the 2017 Terry Bryant Scholarship winner.
Alyson, thanks for being here.
No problem.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah.
Well now, tell us where you're from and what high school you went to.
I was a senior at Perry High School, which is located in Chandler, Arizona, which is
a suburb of the Phoenix area.
I graduated in the class of 2017.
I am familiar with the Houston area as I applied to a school in that area, but I will be attending
Arizona State University in the fall with The Barrett Honors College to study mechanical
engineering.
Oh, excellent.
Mechanical engineering.
Yes.
Okay.
Yeah.
Very good.
Very good.
Well listen, I've watched your presentation.
We're going to actually show a little bit of it later on, but I think it's phenomenal.
Oh, thank you.
You talk about the inherent dangers of distracted driving.
Tell me a little bit about why that topic resonated with you, and I say that for this
reason.
Because there's a lot of passion in that, especially at the end.
We'll see the end and talk about that, but tell me why that topic resonates with you,
maybe any personal experience you have with it.
Well, for myself, I've actually been involved in a car accident where a distracted driver
hit me.
Wow.
He hit the side where my younger sister was on, so I personally felt ... Fortunately,
everyone was okay, but the car was damaged severely.
For myself, I wanted to make a presentation and speak out about a lot of people are driving
and are unaware of the effect they can have if they're not focused on it.
When you're driving, it requires your full attention.
If you're not willing to give that full attention, then you shouldn't be driving.
Yeah.
That's why I wanted to speak to that and help others see that point of view.
Yeah.
You know, I thought there might be a personal story there because your presentation had
a lot of passion in it.
Yeah.
I could just feel the passion in it.
As I said, especially at the end when you talk about statistics ... You come down to
the end, it's pretty powerful.
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Thank you.
Let me ask you this because as a ... I'm confident, and especially now in meeting you even though
briefly, I'm sure that you're a role model to a lot of people.
Thank you.
What do you have to say to maybe younger people that are tempted to drive distracted?
What advice do you have for them?
My advice would first be that your life and your ... Even if it's not so much your life,
because not everybody loses their life, but you want to avoid a car accident at all cost.
You don't want to injure anyone else.
We're all on the road together, so you have to hold accountability for yourself to be
a responsible driver.
I know a lot of students who get their driver's license.
They're new to driving, and they don't have the experience that older drivers do.
They'll get in car accidents because they'll do things that they see experienced drivers
doing without having that experience, such as texting and driving or driving if they've
been drinking, which you should never do either of those.
Because at the end of the day, you have a responsibility every time you get behind the
wheel to drive to the best of your ability.
If you're impaired or if you're distracted, then you're not driving to the best of your
ability.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Absolutely.
Let me ask you this because this is a little bit of a more difficult situation.
If you're a passenger in a car with a peer and they're distracted in some way while they're
driving, how do you address that situation?
Or do you address it?
Well, you should always address it.
Because at the end of the day, not only is it yourself in danger, but your friend.
If you care about your friend, then you should help that they are driving responsibly.
Yeah.
I have been in this situation myself, personally.
I think every teenager has, and the best thing I've found is to tell them, "Hey, if you're
driving, then you should be focused on driving."
If they're texting, maybe offer to send the text for them, or take the phone away.
Just some things that they don't have to worry about whatever's going on on their phone and
that you can help them out.
Because at the end of the day, you're both trying to get there together safely.
Helping them out to realize that they're not being safe in that moment might be difficult,
but ultimately you're helping both of you.
Right.
Right.
How difficult is it to deal with what can potentially be peer pressure in a situation
like that?
It depends also on the type of friends you have.
Like, if you have a friend who you're very close to and they are aware that you guys
are best friends, then it's a lot easier to say, "Hey, I really care about you.
This is not safe, and we need to address this.
We can't be doing this while we're driving."
If it's a newer friend, you might want to step back and don't want to step on their
toes, but, like I said, if you're in a vehicle with this person and they're going to be responsible
for your safety, then you have every right to address if they're not driving safely.
Yeah.
If they're not, you have to be able to stand your ground and say, "Hey, I'm not going to
let you make me back down from this.
This is not right.
I would rather drive myself or drive separately."
That way, you're not in that situation again if they're not responding to you.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think that's great advice, and I think that young people have to do that.
Because it's like you said, I mean, both lives are really at risk in those situations as
well as other drivers, potentially.
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Yeah.
Of course.
I mean, we're all driving here together.
We can never be responsible for what other drivers are doing, but we can be responsible
for ourself and be more aware to avoid dangerous situations.
Do you see this as a big problem with young people today?
Oh, yeah.
Definitely.
Of course.
I would say so.
I mean, even with myself there's times where it's like I'm in the middle of a text conversation
and I have to drive somewhere, and it's like ... I really have to work to say, "Hey, I
got to go right now.
I need to go drive."
You have to kind of put your effort into it and say, "I'm going to make a commitment to
myself and to the other drivers on the road to drive safely."
I think it's really prevalent also with social media and notifications on your phone.
Because even people who get notifications I see won't even go to respond to them but
just to check them.
It's like, that's still two seconds that you have your eyes off the road.
That's right.
You need to have complete focus.
Right.
Right.
I think it's definitely something we need to address more.
Yeah.
Well, Alyson, let's watch a little bit of that presentation right now.
Okay.
Yeah, let's do so.
Well, as I said, and for those of you that just watched that, that end is very powerful
when it talks about zero.
I wrote it down.
Zero, that's the number of excuses there are for being a distracted driver.
Yes.
That's a great message to all of us because I don't care what the reason is, there are
zero excuses for being a distracted driver.
The odds are just too great.
Yeah.
I think- I mean, your safety is important above any
conversation, social media post.
Your safety comes before anything on your phone.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Now, I believe you said- Or not even on your ... Oh, sorry.
No, go ahead.
Or not even on your phone, but also what's going on in your vehicle.
If you have a passenger or something and they're trying to distract you, you need to have a
conversation with that passenger to say, "I'm trying to get us both to where we need to
be safely, and I care about you, and I need to focus on the road."
Yeah.
It's not even always phones but just all the other distractions we have.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Now, how did you come to find out about this scholarship and apply?
What was the process?
Were you just searching online, or how did it come about that you knew about this?
Well, I was searching online.
I was using a specific app, that's Scholly, which offers a lot of scholarships.
Okay.
I went through Scholly.
I saw the Terry Bryant Scholarship, and I realized that it was about distracted driving.
Oh, excellent.
That was something where I had already done presentations on then, and it was something
that I personally had some knowledge of.
I figured I could share that, and if I happened to win the scholarship, it would be a great
thing for my family and I to go to college.
Yeah.
Oh, that's terrific.
That's terrific.
What is your thoughts about what ... Mr. Bryant, and I think you know a little bit about his
firm.
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
They deal with the unfortunate results of accidents just like this where there's been
a distracted driver, someone is injured.
What is your perception as far as that type of work and that business.
I'm just curious about what you might think as a young person.
I mean, obviously, I don't have much experience with the law or anything like that, but I
do think it's important to bring justice.
I know for myself when I was in my car accident, my car was nearly totaled.
We had to go through a lot of stuff with who was being cited.
They were ultimately cited with everything, but in that moment, I knew it was nice to
have somebody on my side who was going to make sure that my car wasn't going to be lost
or that I wouldn't lose any of my privilege for somebody else's actions.
Yeah.
It was nice for me to know that somebody was there to help me out in that situation.
That's good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think it's valuable work also to bring more attention as well to the situation, to say
if you've been involved in an accident, you don't have to be silent and you don't have
to just let it go.
You can make sure that justice is given, you know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Because of that work and what Mr. Bryant deals with, and that's part of why he developed
this scholarship, to address this problem and try and create more awareness ... There
is a lot of awareness, but it's almost like you can't have too much awareness because
this is truly a pervasive problem.
Oh, yeah.
It's something that everybody experiences every day.
I mean, I think everybody has had an experience where they're driving down the road on a busy
highway, and they'll look beside them and see somebody on their phone.
It's almost like, "How are you driving and doing this at the same time?"
It concerns you because it's like, "I'm on the road with this person who is being irresponsible."
Right.
If you have that concern, then it's your responsibility to make sure that you're not concerning others
and that you're being responsible.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's my personal opinion of it.
Yeah.
No, that's great.
Alyson, you're quite an impressive young lady.
You truly are.
Thank you.
You mentioned, I believe, that you said you want to ... Did you say you want to be a mechanical
engineer?
Yes.
Okay.
I'm going through mechanical engineering right now.
Tell me exactly what that role is.
I'm not completely sure what a mechanical engineer does, and why you chose it.
Well, for me, I chose mechanical engineering because I looked at many different disciplines
of engineering, and I found that there was not one specifically that called out to me.
I liked a little bit of everything.
Okay.
I looked at mechanical engineering, which focuses a bit more on the process of engineering,
as well as how we can improve systems and how they can work more effectively, while
also combining chemistry and physics, which are my favorite class subjects.
Wow.
Wow.
Wow.
On top of that it's more math heavy.
I've always been that weirdo who loves math, so I would love to do a job where I could
work with math and calculus.
Give me a specific application of maybe the type of thing that you would hope to do when
you graduate.
Well, I know for myself, I did a job shadow with Air Products, which is a company that's
national, but they have a campus here in Arizona.
Okay.
I went and I job shadowed the plant engineer, which was very interesting to me because his
job was basically looking at their distribution system and seeing how they can improve it,
how they could work more effectively and basically provide people their services easier and faster.
Yeah.
It was a lot of math.
It was also a lot of hands on, where he was out in the campus actually working on the
units, which is another thing I like.
I like being able to work with my hands, so for me, having that experience and talking
to him was something that inspired me to go into mechanical engineering.
I think after I graduate, I would hope to go into something similar to that, working
with a plant, or quality review, or something like that.
Excellent.
Excellent.
Well, I know that you have a bright future ahead of you.
Thank you so much.
Go ahead.
I just want to say thank you for interviewing me and for being able to allow me to share
my opinion on this.
I was so honored to win this scholarship, and I would love to help bring more awareness
to the issue.
Oh, well you've done that, and that's awesome.
What a lovely young lady.
Is there anything you want me to pass on that you'd like to say to Mr. Bryant personally?
I would love to thank him for the opportunity to have this scholarship.
I can't tell you how much it means to my family and I. I'm the first child, and I ... Well,
I'm the first child in my family to ever go to college, so we've been struggling with
how are we going to pay for all this when scholarships are available but it's difficult
to win them?
So, I would like to thank Mr. Bryant for giving this opportunity to more students and allowing
it to be something where not only are you able to help pay for school, but also to help
your fellow peers in awareness.
I myself learned stuff that I didn't know about distracted driving, so it was a valuable
experience.
I'm very glad to have applied for this scholarship.
Thank you so much.
You are a delightful young lady, and honestly, I thank you.
It's our privilege to get to interview you and talk with you.
I think you have ... Not only did you do a powerful presentation, but you just gave a
powerful interview that I think- Thank you.
... will live on through video and digital media and inspire other young people.
Alyson, thank you so much for being with us today.
No problem.
Thank you so much for having me.
Okay.
Best of luck to you.
Thank you.
Best of luck to everyone at Terry Bryant and all of their customers.
Thank you.
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