Stress gets to us, eventually. Some of us combat it by working out after work, others crack open an ice cold beer when they get home.

Well, apparently, one Tinley Park man could not do that. In a story on TribLocal from reporter Ashley Rueff, a man was charged with driving under the influence of alcohol after he was allegedly drinking vodka from a flask on the commute home.

The reason? Stress.

What kind of job is so stressful that you have to drink to get through the work day? Even the most stressful jobs such as a brain surgeon or being the president of the United States do not give you the freedom to drink while on the job. Pass the scalpel and the martini, please.

What can we NIU students take from this news? Drinking and driving is nothing to fool around with. We are all college students, most of us will be drinking but please do not drink and drive. And do not let your friends do it either, even if they have had “only a couple.”

In 2008, in Illinois out of the 1,043 people that had died due to alcohol impairment in a vehicle, 362 of them were because of the drivers’ blood alcohol content was above .08.

Over a thousand people could have been saved if they had a designated driver system.

Especially with cold weather right around the corner, no one is going to want to walk home after bar hopping from Molly’s to Starbusters, so start establishing designated drivers.

A designated driver program can easily be set up within an organization like a fraternity or sorority. In Alpha Sigma Alpha, we use a system called “Safe Sister.” Girls are designated drivers for the night so that they can drive their sorority sisters safely from place to place.

“As a victim of a drunk driving accident, I’m a huge supporter of Safe Sister,” freshman marketing major Christine Cortina said. “It allows our 21 and older girls to get to and from different locations without having to brave the cold weather or various other nighttime hazards.”

Any organization or any group of friends should follow this trend. Have people rotated as designated driver and maybe as a reward for driving around your drunk friends one night, they will buy you a round of drinks the next weekend.

But of course the biggest reward of the system is that your friends get home safely.