“When a student enrolls in my program, I have one requirement. They must pledge that, during the course of their career, they will save at least one life,” says Tapan Datta, professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, College of Engineering.

Datta established the Transportation Research Group at the university. Datta’s passion for saving lives begins with students. At the start of each school year at WSU, his group puts on a three-day safety campaign, Drive Safely to Wayne State. Employing sobering displays, such as a crashed car, and interactive devices, such as Fatal Vision goggles, the event is designed to instill safe driving practices among students.

A few years ago, the group identified 200 high-crash intersections in Detroit and Grand Rapids, Mich. With computer modeling programs and state-of-the-art analysis, they found ways to reduce accidents and injuries by at least 25 percent.

In 2004, as a direct result of the Drive Safely to Wayne State campaign, safety belt usage around the main campus increased by 8.64 percent. According to standards of the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration, that reduces the risk of severe injuries in a crash by 50 percent and reduces the risk of death by 45 percent. Michigan State Police called the campaign one of the most effective safe-driving programs in the country.