“The Little Risks” -The Minor Difference between Life and Death-

I’ll never forget May 18 of 2024. I had returned home from a pleasant school day and greeted my grandmother, who was staring at a picture on her phone. My grandmother doesn’t speak a lot of English as a native Honduran, but the fear in the sentence she spoke to me transcended language. I heard “Isabel” (my sister’s name), “carro” (the word for car in Spanish), and “roto” (a form of the verb ‘to break’). My grandmother then showed me the picture she had been looking at. It was my sister’s car, upside down, against a curb. My stomach dropped. I knew that my sister was a good driver, she went through Driver’s Ed, and I knew she would never make a rash or dangerous decision that would put her, or others’ lives at risk. But I couldn’t say the same for many other drivers. And that was what scared me.

It’s at times like these where the importance of Driver’s Ed, and extensive practice handling cars is clearly seen. I, like most of the teen population, didn’t appreciate the blessing that was an education in driving. It was a burden. It took two hours out of my summertime, forced me to sit in a car awkwardly with strangers, and prompted my parents to have panic attacks while in the car with me driving. And above all else, I found it boring. I assumed I knew everything about driving already and zoned out during almost every class. The classes required to obtain licenses and permits are cursed at and hated, but when we really compare the time spent bored, to the rest of our lives, we can see that the hundred hours or so spent in class or practice, determines our safety for the rest of our lives. An experiment done by the University of Nebraska divided student drivers into two groups. One to receive official teaching, and the other to have none. The experiment found that the latter group of young drivers receiving informal instruction were more likely to get into car crashes (non-fatal and fatal), than those who participated in the official Driver’s Ed course. Those more likely to get into a crash weren’t just people who got into a car without knowing any information on driving. They were people who practiced driving with an authority figure such as a parent for 50 hours. The difference between the two? Informal instruction just focuses on the laws and guidelines of navigating roads and highways. Drivers’ education emphasizes the potential risks that many could—and have—fall prey to, such as multitasking with a phone in your hand, zoning out listening to music, eating while driving, or driving with multiple distracting passengers. These little risks that we take for granted are the difference between life and death, and not just for the driver.

I remember many times when I watched my friends break the rules of driving to connect a phone to the radio, or speed through a busy street on the way to school, but one instance in particular stands out the most. It was a sunny day; I was in the car with a friend, who was driving up to a crosswalk where we needed to turn. The music was on, and I was daydreaming. My friend had their phone in hand trying to change a song. They started to pull ahead to make the turn, when out of the corner of my eye I saw a couple crossing in front of us. My friend looked up before I could say a word and hit the brakes quickly. The couple never noticed. My friend was visibly shaken but continued to drive down the road with a phone in hand. I watched the road intently after that.

No one wants to admit the risks we take every day while driving. No one wants to think that they could become a killer at any moment. But that is the plain truth. Each minimal risk is one that could result in tragedy, punishment, and even jail. In the infamous warning stories our parents told us about car wrecks and fatalities, what was the cause? Phone usage, driving under the influence, or being risky for a friend’s entertainment. My sister’s crash? Caused by a young driver who didn’t have a proper view of the road ahead but decided to take the risk and move forward. The vehicle directly hit the side of my sister’s car and caused her to roll upside down twice, until hitting a curb. My sister sustained minor injuries, but everyone knew the worst possible scenario could have easily happened that day, because of a young driver’s risk.

To reduce the increasing deaths, we as a nation need to be more cautious and recognize the weapon we could become with one little mistake. We need to continue to push and support Driver’s Ed to be mandatory to every teenager, even amidst complaints and arguments that it isn’t necessary. We need to help provide free or at least cheaper education to low-income families and schools, so that those drivers won’t be forced to take risks to go from one place to another. But when those goals seem too grand or unrealistic, what can we do then?

We can be an example of cautious and safe driving to those around us. We can ignore the peer pressure from our friends to take risks or speed up while driving. We can set up navigation or music before we begin driving so we don’t have to multitask on the road. We can focus more on the road before us, and prioritize the journey, instead of rushing dangerously toward the finish.

Sources:

University of Nebraska-Lincoln | Web Developer Network. “Study: Driver’s Ed Significantly Reduces Teen Crashes, Tickets.” Study: Driver’s Ed Significantly Reduces Teen Crashes, Tickets | News Releases | University of Nebraska-Lincoln, University of Nebraska, newsroom.unl.edu/releases/2015/08/13/Study:+Driver’s+ed+significantly+reduces+teen+crashes,+tickets#:~:text=%3E%2011.1%20percent%20of%20the%20driver’s,did%20not%20take%20driver’s%20education. Accessed 31 July 2024.