Editor’s note: Today’s letters to the editor are from Southwest Junior High students learning about persuasive writing.

To the editor:

Driving while talking on a cell phone is bad. It can cause accidents and kill people. Take this story from the Denver News, for example. There was an 18-year-old girl killed in an auto accident by the driver of a 1999 Chevy Tahoe who ran a red light and broadsided her on Feb. 6. The 24-year-old man was preoccupied with his cell phone when he ran the red light. The teen was on her way home from the dentist’s office. After the collision, her father said, “I can’t imagine that there would have possibly been that important of a phone call that would have been worth taking somebody’s life for.”

It is proven that talking on a cell phone while driving increases the risk of accidents. Cell phone distractions cause 2,600 deaths and 330,000 injures in the United States every year. That’s why you shouldn’t use cell phones while driving.

Miah Glover,

Southwest Junior High