Safe Kids Buckle Up is the largest, most comprehensive program of Safe Kids USA. Since 1996, the General Motors Corporation has served as Safe Kids Buckle Up's exclusive funding source and helped build Safe Kids Buckle Up into a multifaceted national initiative, bringing motor vehicle safety messages to children and families through community and dealer partnerships.
The program offers parents and caregivers hands-on instruction about car seats, booster seats, and seat belts and presents interactive educational programs for children ages 14 and under.
Safe Kids Buckle Up provides grants to Safe Kids coalitions to conduct safety programs at the local level. These networks of
grassroots volunteers include nationally certified child passenger safety technicians, transportation safety experts, public officials,
police officers, nurses, public health experts and General Motors dealerships.
Since the program's inception, more than 19 million people have been exposed to Safe Kids Buckle Up events and community outreach efforts. Certified child passenger safety technicians working through Safe Kids coalitions have examined more than one million child safety seats at 50,000 events and the program has donated 366,000 seats to families in need.
What we do - Visit our CPS and Safety In and Around Cars Web site
Safe Kids Buckle Up funds and equips state and local Safe Kids coalitions to serve the public in cooperation with GM. Safe Kids Buckle Up provides media and community outreach, education and training, public policy assistance, educational materials and research to communities across the country. GM dealerships serve as meeting places where community members can obtain safety information and attend car seat safety checkups and special safety events. Safe Kids Buckle Up encourages dealers to learn as much as possible about child passenger safety, so they can be recognized as local safety resources.
How we get things done
Safe Kids Buckle Up's community education and programs are conducted through Safe Kids USA's 600 local coalitions and chapters. We reach families in a variety of settings, including:
Car Seat Checkup Events
At Safe Kids Buckle Up Car Seat Checkup events, child passenger safety technicians teach families how to correctly transport their children and help make sure everyone in a vehicle is buckled up on every ride. These
events, most of which are open to the public, are conducted in central locations such as General Motors dealerships, hospitals, community centers and shopping centers.
Mobile Car Seat Checkup Vans
Safe Kids Buckle Up has 137 Mobile Car Seat Checkup Vans serving families in communities across the United States. Each Chevrolet van is a specially designed, self-contained unit with the ability to turn any parking lot into a full-service car seat safety event site. Every state has at least one van in operation.
Inspection Stations
Safe Kids coalitions operate approximately 450 permanent child passenger safety inspection stations throughout the United States to teach parents and caregivers how to safely transport children. Regular hours of service are set at central locations such as General Motors dealerships, hospitals, fire stations, and insurance companies.
Safety In and Around Cars
Safe Kids Buckle Up has evolved to include safety programs beyond car seats and crash protection. Approximately 10 percent of motor vehicle-related deaths to children are considered non-traffic-related, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Such incidents occur somewhere other than a public highway, street or road - for example, when children are struck by vehicles in parking lots or driveways or when they are left unattended in vehicles. These entirely preventable injuries and deaths are serious public health issues. Three Safe Kids Buckle Up programs - Spot the Tot, Never Leave Your Child Alone and Preventing Trunk Entrapment - stress that vehicles are not toys and children of any age should never be alone in or around them.
Outreach Partners
Our partnerships with groups such as the NAACP, the National Council of La Raza, the Urban League and other local community organizations have allowed Safe Kids
Buckle Up to reach some of the underserved families that need our assistance the most.
Working with the Boy Scouts of America, we recently designed the Automotive Safety Patch program for the Cub Scouts to meet the vehicle safety needs of kids 6 to 10 years old, an underserved age group.
NASCAR Events
Hundreds of thousands of NASCAR fans have had the opportunity to "test-drive" the
Safe Kids Buckle Up program through an interactive display that demonstrates the similarities between safety features used by their favorite Chevrolet race car drivers and those available in child safety seats and seat belts. Experts are on hand at the events to answer questions, and families receive educational materials to take home.
Research
Research conducted by Safe Kids USA shows that the education parents receive at Safe Kids Buckle Up events keeps their children safer in vehicles. Based on data from car seat checkup events conducted in 29 states in February 2005, Safe Kids found that parents successfully changed their behavior and retained their child passenger safety knowledge six weeks after receiving hands-on instruction. At a second child safety seat checkup, 45 percent more seats were correctly installed by parents than at the first instructional event. No children arrived at the second event unrestrained.
Legislation
All 50 states plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have laws governing child passenger safety. However, Safe Kids USA and our coalitions continue working to upgrade laws and enact booster seat legislation to cover children who do not properly fit in an adult seat belt. Working with General Motors, Safe Kids Buckle Up provides grants to select coalitions to improve or enforce their states' laws.
Why it's important
Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death among children ages 2 to 14. In 2006, 1,794 children ages 14 and under died and an estimated 208,000 were injured in motor vehicle crashes. Additionally, 45 percent of kids 14 and under who died in crashes were completely unrestrained.
Correctly used child safety seats are extremely effective, reducing the risk of death by as much as 71 percent, but nearly 73 percent of child restraints are not installed or used correctly. This number refers solely to at least one critical misuse, meaning one that could increase the risk of injury to a child in a crash. Critical misuse is most frequently found among seats appropriate for younger children, exceeding 84 percent for infant seats, slightly less for toddler seats and less than 40 percent for booster seats (NHTSA, 2006). It is also estimated that children ages 12 and under are up to 36 percent less likely to die in a crash if they are in a rear seat of a passenger vehicle.
Important Information
Local Events
