Colleges push ride-hailing safety measures
After student’s death, campaign to protect riders gains traction
Several Capital Region colleges are picking up on a nationwide campaign to have students make sure they are actually getting into a ride-hailing car like an Uber or Lyft when they call for such a service from their smartphones.
“It’s gaining traction,” Siena College spokeswoman Lisa Witkowski said of the #What’smyname campaign that reminds people to make sure their driver is the same person that they hailed via a smartphone app.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute officials also are aware of the campaign and they plan to help spread the message to students, said spokesman Reeve Hamilton.
The campaign, which has spread quickly on social media, started at the University of South Carolina after a student there, Samantha Josephson, was killed in March after she mistakenly got into a car she believed to be the Uber ride she had hailed.
It wasn’t, and Josephson was later found dead in a field 90 miles away after turkey hunters came across her body.
The What’s My Name concept is simple. Users of Uber or Lyft should ask their driver if they know their passenger’s name before getting in the car.
That’s because Uber and Lyft drivers get the name of the person who is requesting the ride on their phones, so they should know.
At Siena, Witkowski said the school’s art director designed a flier that school officials have
Region is an incredible understatement,” said Eberle, who took the reins at the Community Foundation in 2016. “Nonprofits are some of the most complex and sophisticated entities in our area, not to mention a major economic engine.”
Eberle also referenced a recent John Hopkins study, which found that 90 percent of total new job creation in the Capital Region is nonprofitdriven.
If treated as its own industry, the nonprofit sector would constitute the area’s largest employer, with a workforce boasting close to 80,000 employees and $9.2 billion in revenue.
In addition to discussing the sector’s scope and scale, panelists touched on its constant evolution as the lines between nonprofits, business and government continue to blur.
They also debated the role technology plays in decision making, the benefits of collaboration and the increased demand for nonprofits to function as economic drivers within the community, in addition to providing more traditional safety net roles.
“Running a nonprofit is, like Ginger Rogers said, dancing backwards in heels,” Skripak said.
“I love that, because it’s so true,” Schultz added. “Many nonprofits don’t have the time and capacity to do everything on their to-do list.”
“Too often, state agencies don’t allow nonprofits to be creative to meet their mission,” said Sauer, who was named one of City & State New York’s 50 most powerful influencers in the nonprofit sector.
This year’s Capital Region Gives special section will build on last year’s theme of “nonprofits as an economic engine” by highlighting how local organizations bring out the best of philanthropy, business and government in the community.
The 40-plus page editorial effort gives nonprofits the attention they deserve.
Many of these organizations work quietly, with little recognition and minimal funding, in an effort to improve the lives of our neighbors.
“My organization has collaborated with 17 others that do similar work,” Allen said. “Collaboration is the wave of the future, and I think it’s very effective.”