Be Smart When Behind the Wheel

Driver education is an extremely essential part of preventing driving-related fatalities because it teaches the proper and safe way to traverse roads, always highlights the responsibilities of the driver, and tests driving abilities to create accident-less roadways. As a part of driver education, each student is taught the correct way of driving that will result in no accidents by their fault. This includes how to turn the steering wheel to prevent loss of control, the importance of stop signs and how to properly obey them, teaching the extremely terrible effect of driving while under influence, and safely driving in adverse conditions. Also, student drivers are taught what they need to do while being in the front seat. For example, the driver must be aware of their surroundings, so they aren’t caught off-guard when the car in front halts or a person enters the street ahead unexpectedly. Driver education internalizes the significance of allowing first responders through too. Lives could be at stake when the sirens are on, so it becomes imperative to grant swift passage to those first responders in order to save those lives. Finally, getting formal education about driving also means taking a test to prove driving capability. This is pivotal because it helps prevent unsafe drivers from taking to the roads, and possibly causing fatal accidents.

To lower the number of deaths caused by driving, we should reinforce the importance of key aspects of safe driving like speed limits, complete focus on traveling the road, and the severity of driving under the influence. First off, speeding is a pervasive problem in developing safe roads because speeding is seen as socially acceptable in society today. Driver education, enforcement, and society itself should drill the importance of speed limits as speeding leads to many accidents. By ensuring speed limits are followed, drivers will be able to respond to road disruptions and accidents much more safely. Also, lowering speed limits on pedestrian-heavy city streets would be beneficial as drivers will have greater ability to avoid pedestrian-involved casualties as they are driving at lower speeds. Another step to enact is greater focus to ensure attentive driving is happening. Many accidents are caused by drivers not seeing something or something unexpected happens. In many cases, attentive drivers might have been able to understand what was about to happen and take steps to avoid major accidents and fatalities. Similarly, texting while driving should be eliminated as the driver’s focus is far away from the road and accidents with casualties could easily happen. This problem is especially prevalent for teens so that must be a pivotal point in educating them about proper driving. Driving under the influence is a major problem too as this very easily causes fatal crashes. We must work to make this criminal action widely disapproved and corrected as it can easily lead to severe damage if it continues. 

Personally, I have experienced two accidents that happened with my family members. The first involved my mother in the Kwik Trip parking lot where an inattentive driver backed out without looking behind him. This led to him backing into my mom’s car but luckily there was minimal damage, almost no injury, and the other driver took responsibility to pay for the damages. Even as a passenger, I became very stressed and sad because I view accidents as a frightening event. Consequently, this meant insurance rates would go up so I felt emotional because my mom would have even more stress in her life with higher insurance rates and repairing the car. The second experience was my brother’s fault as he believed he could make a right turn quickly before oncoming cars approached. This resulted in him t-boning a car but fortunately nobody was hurt, and my brother was able to work it out with the other driver. I was very surprised when it happened because it was obvious that he wouldn’t be able to make the turn in time. This could have been much worse though as the other driver said they sometimes had children in their car, sitting near where it was hit.

Especially because of those incidents, I take safe driving very seriously as lives can be cut short easily and I want to do my best to prevent that from happening. I will improve my personal driving by following speed limits better, maintaining absolute attention to the task of driving, and reducing my time on the road. Speed limits exist for safety, and I will work to follow them even better than I am now because being a couple minutes late is much better than being involved in a serious, possibly fatal accident. Next, I will make sure I maintain high attention to the road and its surroundings, so I am able to spot possible accidents before they happen and give more reaction time to avoid serious injury and fatality. Furthermore, I will keep my driving to a minimum because the less drivers on the road, the less chance of an accident. This will greatly reduce the chances that I will get in an accident and lower the overall possibility of an accident. To improve other’s safe driving skills, I will point out any risky driving habits they have and the importance of discontinuing them. This will support secure roads as there will be one less reckless driver on them.