Educated Drivers Create Safer Roads

Driver safety is an incredibly important topic that every driver should be educated on. If you are an educated driver, you help to reduce the risk of car accidents and deaths. This is something I am very passionate about, as the state of South Carolina (where I live) is continuously ranked number one in states with the most fatal driving accidents. According to, 12% of South Carolinians have an at-fault accident on their record. This is 37% higher than the national average. We also have the highest number of traffic fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled: 1.97. The number of people killed in traffic accidents every year is estimated to be 1 in 4,831. These statistics show just how important driver’s education is to me as somebody that lives in a state with these scary statistics.

If you are 15 or 16 years old in South Carolina and want to get a driver’s license, you are required to have completed an 8-hour driver’s training course. People that are 17 and above are not required to take any form of driver’s training. If more people were required to take driver’s education and learned the risks of being behind the wheel, I’m sure that the number of fatal road accidents would be lowered. As someone who has had to take the 8-hour course to get a license, it definitely highlighted the responsibility I would have for myself and others when I get on the road. I have only ever been in one close call while driving, and it was another car that performed an illegal turn that almost caused me to collide with them. Because of the education I received, I knew the proper thing to do in that situation and was able to avoid an accident. That is why driver education is so important, so you can learn the ways to prevent accidents and become a safer driver.

There have been many instances in which I have witnessed irresponsible driving. I have not been in a car crash, but my father did hit a deer while I was in the passenger seat with him; the deer jumped out from the side of the road and my father could not stop in time, resulting in the deer hitting the front of our car and all of us being propelled forward. Everyone was fine, but having the only thing protecting me from slamming my face into the dashboard being my seatbelt and my father’s arm was terrifying. My father also displays reckless driving on the regular, whether it be speeding 90 mph down the highway, not using his turn signals to indicate lane changes, or exhibiting road rage often. He also performs rolling stops, which I try to catch him on when I can. Other family members have shown some reckless driving as well, though none are as bad as my father.

One of the steps that I take to become a safer driver is to pay attention to the road. I make sure to put my phone away and have it on silent, and I don’t check it until I reach my destination. I know many people that don’t do this, such as my father and my mother’s fiance. I try to help my family ditch this habit by offering to check their phone for them, which is what I do for my mother. Another way in which I pay attention to the road is to either turn the radio off or to have it turned down low. I also make sure to wear my glasses so I can see the road. Another step that I take is to always be aware of my surroundings. I constantly look at the road in front of and around me, making sure that my eyes don’t fixate on one spot and ignore everything else around it. I pay attention to the cars around me since their performance on the road is just as important as my own. When the traffic light turns green, I always wait for a second to make sure that nobody is trying to run a red light before I proceed.

I have several solutions that could help reduce the number of driving-related deaths, specifically in South Carolina. For one, we need to invest in better roads; South Carolina has consistently ranked number one in the country for worst roads. This is due to a lack of care for the quality of our roads, which are riddled with potholes and are otherwise poorly taken care of. If we had better roads, fewer accidents would happen. Another solution is to require driver’s education to be taught in schools again. This would help to provide education to those that cannot afford to sign up for the 8-hour driver’s course.