Active Driving

In the quiet hours before the sun rises and people start getting ready for work, most roads are barren- devoid of the hundreds of cars that call the streets home. There are very few students who can use the full faculties of their minds in these wee hours, and yet countless high schoolers have to drive to school before the sun ever crests the horizon.

From my own experience, whenever I have to drive to school in the morning, especially after a restless night, my ability to quickly make decisions- a much needed skill when driving, is greatly reduced. There are several times that come to mind where I almost ran a red light, and I have certainly seen many other people run red lights, likely unable to process what is happening before they cross the intersection.

The issue of students having to drive in the morning is one that has not been addressed properly. New drivers, along with the elderly, are among the most vulnerable drivers on the road, yet they are made to drive when they are barely awake. The most obvious solution would be to push back high school start times and make the younger students in elementary school and middle school start earlier instead. However, then younger students may not get enough sleep in what are the most formative years of their lives, negatively affecting their education. The issue is a complex one, which is most likely the reason it has not been addressed.

Until such a time where the problem of school schedules has been solved in regards to getting every student the right amount of sleep, there are actions that can be taken by every individual to make them safer on the roads.

The most important thing to do is to get enough sleep. This especially pertains to students, many of whom are awake well past midnight for some reason or another, but a person who gets the recommended amount of sleep is going to be much more alert when they are driving than someone who sleeps for half as much time. It seems simple, but many people underestimate the negative effects of sleeplessness and its effects on motor skills. For students, even if you have to do homework late into the night, there needs to be a point where you stop working and go to bed so you can get enough sleep, even if you are not finished with all of your homework; school is important, but it should never be prioritized over personal safety and the safety of others on the road.

Only once students start getting more sleep can they employ this second step in being safer on the road: being an active driver rather than a passive one. Active driving is the process of anticipating what other people and the environment will do before they do it, and then acting accordingly. Active driving is the opposite of passive driving, where the driver responds to actions on the road instead of anticipating them. People who are driving tired are virtually incapable of active driving in their mental state, thus why getting enough sleep is so important for safe driving.

The concept of active driving illustrates the importance of drivers education; anyone, even someone who did not attend drivers ed, could learn to passively drive. For the most part, passive driving is sufficient to get people from point A to point B, but then there is still the not insignificant risk of getting into an accident because of passive driving. A strong foundation of drivers education teaches drivers how to think and respond rather than react, and that is a very important part of driving safely.

For example, drivers education teaches people to avoid dangerous situations caused by the environment, like large puddles forming on the sides of roads, to mitigate the risk of hydroplaning. Comparatively, a passive driver would ignore the puddle, exposing them to much greater, potentially life-threatening, danger. Another example of active driving is checking the intersection even after the traffic light turns green before accelerating, thereby avoiding any chance of colliding with someone running a red light. I have been driving with friends on several occasions when they did not wait before accelerating through the intersection and then nearly getting hit; it is just one of the things that can only be learned and anticipated through drivers ed, again illustrating the importance of good drivers education.

To reduce deaths from driving, especially among the vulnerable student population, people must begin prioritizing getting enough sleep, and there must be an emphasis placed on active driving through drivers education.