Navigating Responsibility

The reason driver’s education is important is because actually driving is the best teacher. For me, for me to learn something I need to try it over and over until I become comfortable with that skill. So, although the online part and watching videos is important, I think young teens learn more off of the actual driving lessons than from the videos. The reason I say this is because teenagers at 15 don’t have that long of an attention span for that long on something they don’t enjoy. An article from CNLD testing and Therapy titled “How Long Should a Child’s Attention Span Be?” states that the average 15-year-old boy or girl has an attention span of thirty to forty minutes. I guarantee this number is going down over time with more and more social media being influenced in people’s lives. Thus, shows that if they are doing drivers ed online after about thirty minutes, they will tune out and this could be problematic because they won’t be listening to important information that could be lifesaving. So, I believe it is important for teenagers to just lock in for a few hours per day, break it up if they need to give themselves mental breaks because it is crucial to give your full attention to the rules and laws on driving.

To reduce the number of deaths while driving I believe people should put their phones on Do Not Disturb or just power them off completely. The reason being because if you take your eyes off the road that can be fatal, you could swerve off a road, not see someone crossing the road, run a red light, or not see a car trying to get over in your lane or you swerve into their lane. So, I believe that if people put their phones away while driving, we will see a drop in fatalities on the road.

I have had one experience with a car accident, I wasn’t injured, or my car didn’t have any damage but that doesn’t mean it was still life altering and makes you drive more cautiously. It started when I was driving my brother and friends, and we were pulling out of a restaurant and stopped at a light. I was in the right lane to go straight and there as a car next to me in the Left turn lane. I could see the people in that car, they were an elderly couple and looked like really sweet people. As I am still sitting at the light, I see a white car go flying by going probably 80 miles per hour in a 40 mile per hour area and I look at my friend and go “That was weird he was flying.” Not thinking anything of it. Then a few seconds later we hear police sirens in the distance, and we notice it is a high-speed police chase, so we see the Police car coming closer and closer. The left turn arrow turns green, and the elderly couple doesn’t see or hear the police car coming at 80 miles an hour, so they pull out in front of the police car and then you just see a massive collision and see what looked like a car at first look nothing like a car after getting hit by the police SUV. I’m very fortunate my friends saw the police and my light didn’t turn green and the car that got hit didn’t go flying into my car. Anyways, as we get out to see if the elderly couple is okay, we unfortunately see they are not and have tragically passed away. I was just in shock on what I just saw and prayed for the family of the elderly couple and the safety for me and my friends. Since that day I don’t have my music up loud anymore because you want to be able to hear what is going on outside of your car. Lastly whenever I’m pulling out of anywhere, I look twice.

To wrap up it is important to power through those videos and readings even though they can be boring it is essential to know every law about driving. Also to put the phone down when driving. Those text, snap chats, or any other notifications will still be there when you stop driving so focus on the road and save your life and maybe someone else’s. Lastly be aware of your surroundings. You never know what is going on so make sure you look both ways when on the road.