Car crashes are the leading cause of permanent injury and death in youth. The I Promise Program is designed to assist parent reduce the risk of their son or daughter's involvement in a crash.

Program History

In February 2000, Gary Direnfeld, the parent of a soon to be 16 year-old was commuting from Hamilton to Toronto at 5:30am. While following a transport truck he was overtaken by a young driver weaving speedily through traffic. Noticing the 1-800 number on the back of the truck for reporting poor driving, he thought that he would very much like to be able to notify the parents of the speeding young driver. Reminded that his own son would soon be a driver he concerned himself with his safety and injury prevention. It should be noted that Gary Direnfeld is a social worker by profession with years of experience developing and directing brain injury rehabilitation services for young persons who acquired their brain injuries in car crashes. On the commute home he spoke with Kiwanian Andy Gaudet and discussed a concept for teen road safety. Mr. Gaudet coined the name "I Promise Program" and thus the program was conceived. The Kiwanis Club of Hamilton East has since served as a ongoing support, financially, spiritually and morally to facilitate the program's growth.

Research and Program Development
The next several months were occupied with searching and reviewing statistics with respect to teen drivers and reviewing injury prevention programs targeting teen drivers. In June 2000 the first model of the I Promise Program was completed. Also at that time, Direnfeld approached friend, Jan Lowther, former publisher of Canada's leading insurance magazine, the Canadian Underwriter. Ms. Lowther felt there was value in the program and joined the organization to promote its merits to the automobile insurance industry.

Virtual Focus Group, Research and Ongoing Program Development
The Internet was used to look for people to review the program model. Searching for organizations whose mandate would include an interest in safe driving, teens and injury prevention a database of email contact addresses for 200 organizations was developed. The organizations included medical groups, police services, safety and injury prevention groups, etc. Feedback, comments and criticisms were received from numerous individuals. The program model was adjusted accordingly and this process continued. Between December 2000 and January 2001, meetings were also held with CEOs and high level executives from property/casualty insurance companies for their input. The email database has grown to include as many as 17,000 email addresses. Between 2001 and 2004 two research projects were conducted by the Plan-It Safe research program of the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario. Research was conducted under a $104,000.00 grant provided by the Ontario Neurotrauma Foundation. The first research project was formative in nature and consisted of focus groups, designed to assist with the design of the program and materials. The second project was a pilot study to determine if the program was implemented and processes followed as set out. Further, this second project obtained participants feedback for ongoing program design changes. In March, 2004 the program has been redesigned to provide it's key components, the contract and rear window sign, on a free basis, worldwide. The program continues to be updated based upon the input of experts and new research.

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