Students from Mt Victoria Public and Lithgow High School have combined to become film-makers in a project aimed at road safety for older people.
They have created a short film targeting senior pedestrians, who feature in the sad statistics of recent road casualties in the Mountains.
The project was a combined effort from all stage 3 students (years 4, 5 and 6) at Mt Vic, principal Moira McNair said.
Together – with the help of music teacher Patrick Connor - the students created a rap song to go in the film. And four students did the acting – Ellie Molla, Daisy Clark, Megumi Seita and Ali Atoui.
Ellie, in Year 6, said: “It’s for older people who are getting hit on the roads. We show them the wrong things to do, like jaywalking or like not looking before they walk. Then we show them the right way.”
Said Daisy, from Year 5: “It’s to make it more safer for them.”
The filming was done by Lithgow High students.
Jo Davies, from the Blackheath Area Neighbourhood Centre (BANC), which helped secure funding for the project, said the Upper Mountains had one of the fastest growing ageing populations in NSW.
“And between 2010 and 2014, there were 18 serious incidents involving senior pedestrians in the area, with one fatality and 17 casualties involving those aged 60 or over,” she said.
Mt Vic Public principal, Moira McNair, said the students loved making the film.
“It involved a third of the school. And we wouldn’t have been able to do without the organisation of BANC.”
This project was a partnership between BANC, Mt Vic Public and Lithgow High. It was funded by the NSW Centre for Road Safety which wants to reduce annual road deaths and serious injury by at least 30 per cent by 2021.
The program allows for community groups to deliver local safety projects to increase road safety awareness and support safer road use.
The film will screen before selected movies at Mt Vic Flicks and Glenbrook Cinema.