Educating the Future and Driving Towards Success

Man’s best invention; the wheel. Have four of them with power steering and two pedals for “stop” and “go” and a whole continent can be traversed. If only driving were this easy. Operating a vehicle requires focus, discipline, quick decision-making, and the perfect balance of aggression and empathy. But sometimes one of the gears slips. Mom is calling on the cellphone; there is a pretty rainbow in the sky; you have just had a nasty argument with your best friend. Suddenly your mind is not on the road and eventually, neither are you. Even these mundane situations can cost a life. It is these deadly predicaments that are taught to our youth before they even get behind the wheel. It is the best way we can keep our drivers contentious and responsible, which saves their lives and the ones they share the road with.

I waited until I was seventeen to complete my driver’s education and obtained my license shortly before my eighteenth birthday. It was a mix of internalized paranoia, the indecisiveness of just waiting until I was an adult and saving months of supervision and hundreds of dollars. However, I knew how much more confident I would be in myself if I took all the courses and endured the rigor of real practice with my instructor and parents. So, on March 2021, I stepped into the Driving Center, the oldest student in my class. Every time I felt some embarrassment, I just had to remind myself that the more education I received about being a cautious driver, the more confident I would feel at the wheel.

Living in Michigan, the beloved motor state, we take our driver’s education very seriously. The process to get a license is lengthy and complicated, with multiple visits to the Secretary of State office and signing of papers. However, the twenty-one days spent in Driver’s Education class and fifty-six hours spent behind the wheel are not for nothing. Each new driver placed in driver’s education is now equipped with much more wisdom and caution when on the road. This comes from road sign tests, situational videos, and films that warn of the common dangers that sometimes result in tragic fatalities. It is inspiring and mind-boggling to think of all the accidents that are prevented each year when the new wave of students earns their license.

I do not remember the day my sister drove into the back of a pickup truck. I was only four at the time, she eighteen. She was in her first car—a Buick—just like I drive now. I faintly remember her in crutches and can look back on pictures of her at the hospital from an old family digital camera. We are all so lucky she rear-ended from an angle. If it were straight on, there would have been no chance of survival. Still, her life is forever affected by her injury. Thirteen years later she occasionally attends physical therapy to ease the pain in her hip and back on the side she was hit. Breaking the biggest bone in your body will not heal as easily as many of the others. Her story will always remind me that a quick glance at my phone is not worth the cost of a broken femur, at best.

We live in a great age of technology and automobile safety that gets better with each new model of car. There are many life-saving features: seatbelts, air bags, and lane assist, to name a few. The best way to prevent an accident is to take full advantage of these safety features, as well as driving responsibly. This means being completely sober behind the wheel and having no distractions such as food or drowsiness. Any car that is equipped with self-automating tools has been through rigorous testing and general requirements. Any vehicle that does not meet the specific code is recalled and not allowed on the public roads. Judging from this, cars that are available to drivers are trustworthy, and can dramatically decrease the risk of an automobile-related death. Driving is a privilege; every time the engine is turned on and the car leaves the driveway, multiple lives—including the driver’s–are at risk of an accident. Most fatal accidents could have been avoided, had the driver worn their seat belt or decided to call an Uber from the bar. Heartbreaking events like these teach the future generations that taking the simplest of precautions can save their life.