Death, Destruction, and Good Times: Why Driver Education is an Important Part of Learning How to Drive

If people could do more to save their life and the lives of people around them, why do they choose not to? Why do people tend to drive irresponsibly so often for the benefit of themself, but at the cost of the lives of others and sometimes their own too? Part of this is people not being educated as much as they could. No, I am not talking about not graduating or not going to college to further their education. I am talking about driver education. Many people do not take driver education and some take driver education, but do not care enough to pass the class. These people are also those who might not be as educated as the people around them and might not make the decisions or drive as safely as those around them do. While it may take some time out of your day a few days a week, it is completely worth it in the end, and it has made me a better driver than I would have been. Taking and passing driver education is just as important as taking and passing classes in high school and college.

Driver education is extremely important because it can lead to less deaths by car accidents each year and more happy families. By taking the driver education class at my high school over the summer, I learned not only the rules of the road, but also helpful tips and what to do if you might soon be in a car accident. Not only is it important to know what to do in frightening situations on the road, but it could also save your life, as it has done to mine many times and I have only been driving on my own for almost two years. Perhaps I am hapless when it comes to driving; or perhaps people almost cause accidents quite frequently and I never noticed until I was able to drive. When I was first learning how to drive my mom and my driver education teacher told me not only do you have to drive for the safety of yourself, but sometimes you also must drive for those around you. At first, I found this statement quite abstruse, but when they explained it, it means not only must you do your part to make sure you are safe, but you also must do your part to make sure those driving around you are safe. Some may think of this as paying attention to and following the basic rules of the road. My teacher told us to take it a step further. She said you should also be watching out for those around you and if you notice an accident is potentially about to happen, do what you can to prevent the accident without becoming part of the potential accident. Every time I drive down the road, I try to keep this in mind. We were told that not only can you save your life, but you can also save the lives of those around you so no one must worry about whether they will make it home to their family and a child does not have to worry about whether they will see their parent or parents before they go to sleep at night. There have been many times I prevented a potential accident. Some would have been small, while others would have been big. One of the most memorable times was when I was on my way home from work. It was late at night and very dark out and I was sitting in my car at a stop light waiting for the light to turn so I could drive straight across and go home. Across from me was a person sitting in their car in the turn lane also waiting for the light to change. Cars drive past us through the intersection as they typically do while we wait for the light to change. Eventually, the light did change, and the green light lit up for me to go. The car across from me waited for me to drive by as they should because I have the right of way, but I noticed a car approaching the intersection, driving far beyond the speed limit. I sit and wait to see if the driver is going to blow through the intersection even though the light is red or if they will eventually stop. While waiting, the person in the turn lane started to slowly creep forward as if they did not see the fast car approaching the intersection. I did not want the car to be run into by the approaching car, so I took my foot off the brake and allowed my car to start rolling forward. This caused the car to stop just in time to avoid the approaching car. The car eventually slammed on the brakes and screeched to a halt, but they still slid past the white line at the intersection, and into the middle of the intersection. Sometimes I think back on this event and wonder what would have happened if I did not allow my car to roll forward a bit to make the car across from me stop. Would they have continued through the intersection? Would they have eventually noticed the approaching car? Was my action the actual cause behind them stopping? Perhaps they stopped because they thought I was going to drive through the intersection; or perhaps they stopped because they finally noticed the approaching car. Either way, a potentially bad accident was avoided that night, and the lives of people who could have died were saved. Driver education has helped me avoid terrible accidents and I have helped others do the same. Driver education is one of the many things that can be done to help reduce the number of driving-related deaths.

To help reduce the number of driving-related deaths, steps need to be taken. One step to take when trying to lower the number of driving-related deaths is to have camera enforced speed limits. Many accidents occur simply because one or more drivers were speeding. Speed limits exist for a reason and the reason or reasons being the city taking into consideration where neighborhoods are, how busy certain streets are, how frequently people walk down the sidewalk in certain areas, and much more. By camera enforcing speed limits, you are preventing accidents that could have happened, had there been people speeding down the road. Another step we could take to reduce the number of driving-related deaths is stressing how dangerous emotional driving is and people should make sure they find a ride to where they need to go if they are emotional. Emotional driving tends to lead to people speeding to help relieve their feelings, not paying attention enough, and sometimes it also leads to slower reaction times. Cities and towns should also enforce a law stating people should wear reflective gear when walking down streets and sidewalks at night. Why is wearing reflective gear at night important? People are harder to see at night, especially if they are wearing dark colored clothing or are not wearing any reflective gear to make the person luminous. In my city, I personally have nearly run over people wearing all black and walking across the street and I do not notice them until I am almost going to hit them. The rules of the road should also be enforced a bit more strongly for anyone not driving a car. Motorcyclists and bicyclists tend to not follow the rules of the road as well as others. They tend to drive as though they own the entire road and most tend to change lanes without indicating they are going to change lanes. Depending on a person’s reaction time, the motorcyclist or the bicyclist might be run over or run into. They will also drive down the white line dividing the different lanes on each side of the road, especially at stop lights, which is also extremely unsafe and causes many accidents in my city. Along with camera enforced speed limits and stressing the dangers of emotional driving, attending, and passing drivers education class should be required. To drive in the safest and smartest way possible, people need to take driver education. Some people think driver education is a waste of time; however, as shown above, I learned some extremely valuable information through taking driver education. Another one of the many steps people can take is phone companies designing phones to know when a person is driving and not allowing them to unlock or use their phone unless they are stopped or someone is calling them or they need to call 911.One of the newest phones to be built can now sense when an accident occurs and call for help, but what about designing the phone to sense when someone is driving? If a phone can detect an accident, it should be able to detect being in a car moving faster than a person can run or walk. By designing a phone to detect when a person is driving and not allowing them to use their phone unless they are stopped, someone is calling them, or they need to call 911, the number of people looking at their phone while they drive down the road would dramatically decrease. In turn, the number of accidents caused by one or more people being on their phone would also dramatically decrease. Another helpful step we could take is putting safe places for people to take a brief nap along the interstates and highways. Not only have I become tired after driving for a few hours, but others do too. During driver education class, we were told to pull over somewhere and take a brief nap if you are driving down the road and become tired. While this may be a great idea, the world we live in today is not safe enough for people to do that anymore, especially females. As a female, I feel it is impossible for me to find a safe place for me to pull over and take a nap before continuing my drive to my destination because females are more likely to be abducted than males. When I was a young child, my uncle and cousin drove their car off the side of a bridge because they were both tired and while my cousin was asleep, my uncle fell asleep behind the wheel. My cousin’s life seems to have gone back to normal; however, my uncle has a challenging time walking upstairs now because he now must drag one of his legs when he walks, and he tends to trip more easily. Over time, his leg has become a little better and he is able to move it a little more than before, but not in the same way everyone else can. Adding safe places along the interstates and highways for people to take ephemeral naps before continuing their drive to their destination will also help decrease the number of accidents and driving-related deaths caused by one or more people falling asleep behind the wheel. By taking these steps to help prevent driving-related deaths, more people such as myself and my family and my friends will be safer on the road for many years to come. Not only will these steps help everyone, but each person can also do their part to help others drive safely.

While I have never been in an accident, some of my friends and relatives have. While some accidents could have been avoided such as the accident my uncle and cousin were in, others are not as avoidable. My older brother was in a less avoidable accident this year and totaled his car. He was driving home from work when the accelerator on his car suddenly became stuck and when he pushed on the brake, his car spun across the road and into a sign in front of a local business. The accelerator had never stuck before, so he was taken by surprise when it did and he tried his best to regain control of his car, but unfortunately, he crashed the car. He is perfectly fine and only needed to visit a chiropractor to check out his back, but he was quite distraught over what happened because he loved the car. While not much could have been done to prevent my brother’s accident, people can do their best to help others prevent accidents. Something I do to help my mother drive safer is call or message people when she needs to message someone, so she does not text while driving. She does not text while driving anyway, but the more I can do to help, the more focused she is on what is going on around her rather than what someone might have just messaged to her. Another thing I do is to help others be safer on the road by making sure everyone in my car is buckled before I move my car. Making sure everyone is buckled is important to me because if I ever were to be in an accident, everyone would be much safer and more likely to survive if they were safely buckled into my car. I also have my friends or family ride in the back seats of my car until all three spots are full to help eliminate the possibility of them distracting me while I am driving. I also find this important when I am riding in a friend’s car and if I want to show them something, I wait until we have arrived at our destination, so I am not distracting them while they are driving down the road. I also remind my friends not to be on their phone while they are driving if it appears as though they are going to respond to a text message and do something on their phone while driving. When riding with other people, I also try to be aware of everything going on around the car as if I were the one driving. If I notice something such as a car looking as though it will run a red light or a deer running or walking toward the road, I make sure I say something in case the driver has not noticed. I do this to help prevent us ending up in a car accident, so we are not hurt or killed while driving somewhere.

Overall, taking and passing a driver education class is extremely important to help make sure you and the people around you are safe on the road. Taking driver education class not only teaches you the rules of the road, but also what to do in different situations and how to help those around you avoid being involved in an accident. Along with taking driver education, the society we live in can take many steps to help prevent accidents from happening so less driving-related deaths occur each year. Along with everything everyone can do as a society, we can also take different actions to help ourselves and those we are riding with to be safer drivers. By doing this, everyone can go from one place to the next without worrying about whether they will die today on the road.