The Times Herald (Norristown, PA)
‘THIS APP SAVES LIVES’
Rewards teens for good driving habits; technology detects phone use, texting
The name says it all: This App Saves Lives. Co-creator Nate Wagner, a sixth grade infotech teacher at Haverford Middle School, said the app focuses on rewarding smart driving practices and breaking distracting patterns among teens, particularly texting while driving.
“I think everyone’s well aware that it’s obviously a dangerous habit,” Wagner said, of texting. “(Teens) just need the push, a reason to put their phone down.”
When he’s not teaching subjects like financial literacy and entrepreneurship in his classroom, Wagner is a self-proclaimed entrepreneur. He met his new business partner Ryan Frankel, of Philadelphia, through his previous venture, which was a moving company. Wagner said he later found out that Frankel was personally affected by distracted driving.
Frankel was out for a bike ride in 2015 when he was hit by a distracted driver. He fractured his hip and elbow, and was inspired to launch this app during his hospital stay.
Frankel pitched the idea to Wagner in February 2019, and they began development soon after with some help from about a dozen of Wagner’s former students.
“This is geared toward students so [we’re] making students an active participant in the development process,” Wagner said.
The “student ambassadors,” alumni from Haverford Middle School who are now in high school and college, collaborated on the de
“I think everyone’s well aware that it’s obviously a dangerous habit. They just need the push, a reason to put their phone down.” — Nate Wagner, co-creator of This App Saves Lives
sign, marketing, outreach, and reward concepts, according to Wagner. The students worked on a survey that was sent out to area principals this summer and a video describing how the app works.
They’ve also enhanced the app by determining the point systems and adding “gamification,” which allows the user to “move up in badges” after a certain amount of time “driving undistracted.”
Wagner added that the development of the app itself began in April 2019 and was outsourced to a company in Poland. This App Saves Lives, or TASL, launched on Dec. 13, 2019.
Wagner said the app has since partnered with about 70 local high schools to reach students across the area, including Wissahickon High School.
When people download the free app, the technology “detects when you’re moving faster than 10 mph,” Wagner said. Drivers accrue “TASL points” when they do not interact with their phone in the car.
Once a driver earns enough points, they can redeem them for free items at a number of stores including Shake Shack and Urban Outfitters, according to Wagner.
TASL teamed up with more than 20 businesses for discounts on gym memberships, yoga classes, a prom tuxedo, and a free oil change, Wagner said. Most
are available in the Philadelphia area and the surrounding suburbs.
Wissahickon High School principal Lynne Blair said she hopes this app can facilitate a conversation about safe driving.
“I just hope it promotes a level of awareness for our kids just to put the phone down, and what you think could be a five-second glance at a phone can actually cost someone a life,” she said.
If someone looks at their phone or texts for roughly five seconds while driving at 55 mph, “that’s like driving the length of an entire football field with your eyes closed,” according to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The government agency
found that 3,166 people were killed in distracted driving crashes in 2017. There were 599 “nonoccupants,” such as pedestrians or cyclists also killed during that same year.
Six percent of drivers in fatal crashes in 2017 reported being distracted at the time of the wreck, according to the administration’s findings. Additionally, eight percent of drivers ages 15 to 19 years old that were involved in deadly crashes that year “were reported as distracted.”
“This age group has the largest proportion of drivers who were distracted at the time of the fatal crashes,” the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found.
There are 1.5 million crashes, 500,000 injuries
and 3,600 deaths that resulted in some form of distracted driving, according to This App Saves Lives’ website.
Blair acknowledged that she doesn’t think “Wissahickon [High School] is immune from” distracted driving. She added she’ll often see drivers in nearby cars using their phones and hopes the app can reduce the habit associated with texting and driving.
“That’s my biggest fear is that something horrible will happen to one of our kids,” she said.
Wissahickon is promoting TASL by including information in the parent newsletter, in health classes and through the Students Against Destructive Decisions club. Blair stressed that having these types of discussions in
freshman health classes “because those kids don’t even drive yet so for them to kind of have that awareness before they even get their license I think is really helpful…”
The app is available to download on the Apple app store. Wagner said an Android version will be available later this year.
To put it simply, Wagner said TASL helps to reinforce the idea of safe driving through rewarding someone’s positive habits and behaviors.
“You can’t drive down the road without seeing someone texting and driving, or sitting at a stoplight when it turns green with their head down,” Wagner said, “This is about putting a dent into the dangerous habit of distracted driving. That’s our mission.”