By Matthew E. Milliken

mmilliken@heraldsun.com; 419-6684

DURHAM -- Can attending a three-day conference help save a life?

Organizers and participants in the 27th annual statewide conference of Students Against Destructive Decisions hope so. The gathering kicks off this afternoon at the Durham Convention Center and features workshops aimed at improving highway safety, reducing drunken driving and preventing drug use, pregnancy and other afflictions that can irrevocably change -- or end -- teenage lives.

The convention, which is open only to registered SADD members, will draw about 300 people, down from the 340 who attended last year's Raleigh conference. Attendees will not only get advice on the dangers of reckless teenage decisions but also on how to counsel peers or students on making safe decisions.

Student attendees are "the ones who are going to lead the other kids when they get back to their schools, so we try to go a little deeper than just if a prevention professional were to go to students' schools and lecture or something," SADD state coordinator Harriett Southerland said. "And we want young people to understand that their decisions determine the things that happen to them. For instance, in deciding to have unprotected sex, they're deciding to have a baby -- but they don't get the connection."

SADD was founded in Wayland, Mass., by a high school hockey coach after two of his players died in separate car crashes in 1981. North Carolina SADD chapters date back to 1982. The organization, formerly called Students Against Driving Drunk, was renamed in 1997 at the behest of student members.

Today, North Carolina has more than 300 SADD chapters with about 10,000 student members. Ninety percent of the clubs are based at high schools, with the rest at middle schools and colleges.

At Northern High School, SADD endeavors include the prom promise, in which youngsters vow not to drink and drive, and the twice-yearly seatbelt check.

Ebone Evans, a senior in the club, described the latter event this way: "We stand outside and yell at people and tell them to buckle up their seatbelts, and whoever has their seatbelts buckled, we throw candy at them." (The candy bears safety messages.) The activity, she said, is a lot of fun.

Last spring's check, Evans noted, showed that 89 percent of students had buckled their belts.

Evans' classmate, Alexis Sherrill, said she believes that SADD activities are helping her peers. "We're about their age, but if it was teachers or an adult trying to talk to them about [safety issues] they wouldn't really pay attention," she said.

Sherrill and Evans are both headed to this weekend's conference along with their chapter adviser of only six weeks, second-year U.S. history teacher Karla Peraza. Although she is still getting her bearings, she would love to expand the chapter's focus beyond drunken driving.

Peraza is also looking for ways to get youngsters to heed the group's warnings and pledges such as the prom promise.

"It's the challenge of how can you make it relevant enough so that they do do it and not just take it as a joke," Peraza said.