A group of local college students were at a local bar in Poughkeepsie, celebrating before their graduation ceremonies. Ben was happy to be with his friends and had arranged an Uber, so they could all carpool safely back to campus. They’d been drinking. Maybe drinking a lot. But they were all of age and had a lot to celebrate.
Once in the car, Ben realized that a few students he didn’t know had jumped in. One girl was seriously drunk and the guy sitting next to her. kept touching her, asking what her name was. Immediately, Ben thought about what he learned in Family Service’s Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) Training he’d undergone that semester at school. He asked the girl if she knew this guy. She rolled her eyes and said, “No way.” The guy became aggressive and said, “She’s going home with me.” Ben immediately asked the Uber driver to pull over and escorted the man out of the cab.
The next day the girl, Annie, found Ben on campus and thanked him. She had been afraid, but was too drunk to know what to do. Thanks to United Way’s support of the MVP Program, Ben was able to know how and when to intervene.
