Get Home Safe is a service whereby students who are intoxicated or feel otherwise vulnerable can be safely picked up and driven home by trained drivers who are on duty three nights a week.
Get Home Safe is a service whereby students who are intoxicated or feel otherwise vulnerable can be safely picked up and driven home by trained drivers who are on duty three nights a week.
“I have used Get Home Safe once and I am so happy that there is a programme like this. I can trust that if a
friend or I are in trouble, or if we are too drunk, the Get Home Safe team will fetch us from wherever we are,” says a second year student who used the service last year.
“The service runs weekly on a Wednesday, Friday and Saturday from 10pm until 3am,” said Dean of Students, Prof Vivian de Klerk.
With around 52 callouts last year, after the programme was launched early last year the project is still going strong. When the programme resumed on 3 February there were five callouts on the first night.
The programme pairs a female driver with a male driver and the drivers are paid a flat rate of R100 even if they do not get any call outs and R150 if they have been called out.
The programme advertises around campus that they need drivers during August / September of every year and those that make it to the shortlist are interviewed.
“We have four drivers from last year that will continue working this year and 10 new drivers, so altogether we have six male and six female full time drivers as well as two reserve drivers,” said De Klerk.
Get Home Safe can be reached on 084 869 9679.
