BIKE TO SCHOOL

BY NIKITA LUTHFI ADRIANA from indonesia

The project "Bike To School" emerged from CARS Indonesia members' concern about the increasing number of underage drivers, specifically junior high school-aged motorcycle riders, who often weren't old enough to legally hold a driver's license.

To address this, the group organised road safety-themed activities in partnership with SMPN 1 Kertosono, which consisted of students' training, creative competitions (e.g. speech, news reading), and advocacy. Through this action, Nikita and her team increased the students' awareness and willingness to obey traffic rules. The project was implemented in collaboration with local police (Polsek Kertosono) and the local cyclist community (Kertosono Bersepeda "KOBERS").

The project conveyed these aspirations to the authorities regarding facilities that increased the sense of security for riding a bicycle to school, so that students chose cycling instead of riding motorbikes. The project led to a collaboration with a junior high school in Kertosono District, East Java, under the "One Day Bike To School" policy, in which students rode their bicycles to school together.

The goal of the project was to contribute to reducing the number of underage drivers by raising awareness, promoting and advocating for cycling to school among junior high school students of Nganjuk by December 2022.

ABOUT THE PROJECT LEAD

Nikita is a student of the Faculty of Medicine at Padjadjaran University. She is currently an active member of Center for Youth Action Road Safety (CARS) Indonesia, which aims to help improve and expand our mission in sharing about road safety, especially for youths. She is also a member of a medical students' organisation named CIMSA FK UNPAD, focused on research and exchange.

As a medical student, Nikita learned that everyone's health is an important thing that we have to be aware of. She began to realise that there are many cases of road crashes and even student deaths in her country, Indonesia, both as perpetrators and victims.

Impact snapshots

• Engaged 40%+ of the target student population through creative road safety campaigns and a Bike to School event.

• Secured a government commitment to support youth-led road safety advocacy through a student-developed policy document.

ABOUT THE LEAD ORGANISATION

cars indonesia

Center for Youth Actions on Road Safety (CARS) Indonesia, is an independent, non-profit and non-governmental youth organisation, consisting of students and practitioners in the health field who are concerned about road safety issues. CARS Indonesia focuses its activities on education and advocacy activities to achieve the mission of "Through youths' actions for safer and healthier roads!". Established in 2018, this organisation was launched by the Road Safety Working Group within the Health System Research Center at the Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Padjadjaran in Bandung, Indonesia. It has carried out a variety of initiatives, including safe driving campaigns for the public in Bandung via talk shows and roadside awareness and educational media. Additionally, the group served as surveyors for a research project under the Bloomberg Initiatives for Global Road Safety (BIGRS), conducted in collaboration with the Johns Hopkins International Injury Research Unit (JHIIRU) and the Unpad Faculty of Medicine.