Let’s Race to Reduce Driving Fatalities!

“Hey, let’s race!” Driving out of my high school parking lot after tennis practice, an old upperclassman who had graduated the year before pulled up to my side with about four of my teammates and joked about racing; at least, I thought he was joking. Keep in mind this alumnus was under twenty- one years old, driving with four underage passengers who were not related to him. The next day, one of those passengers told me that the alumnus would have actually raced with me if I had said yes. In fact, my teammate told me that the former upperclassman would drive about ninety miles an hour for fun with my teammates in his car. “Wow,” I thought.

Of course this alumnus had gone to drivers ed and got his license, and he was a young adult fresh out of high school, but that does not give him an excuse to drive recklessly. I knew him as a responsible and good-natured tennis player when he was a senior, but I never knew he would act like a reckless driver. It just goes to show how he must have lacked a more informative driver education. I went to drivers’ ed the summer after my freshman year, and I know how important it is to pay attention to the lessons on the risks of careless driving, but most of the time, the people teaching this information lack enthusiasm, and they do not engage their students to participate in this active learning experience. Even though I paid attention to the countless pointless deaths that result from not following simple driver safety guidelines, it does not mean the rest of the people in the class will pay attention to these lessons that seemed like a boring lecture taking up their free time. As a result, by the time these students graduate from drivers’ ed, they will not think twice about what was instructed as they were not engaged or interested in anything other than getting that class over with and getting their license to drive. This could result in various accidents, injuries, or deaths that could have been prevented had these students paid attention in class and followed the rules of the road. Therefore, to not only make myself a better driver, because even I forget what has been taught in class, but make the people around me safer drivers and reduce the number of deaths due to driving, I think it would be a good idea to implement some driver safety instruction that involved interactive games, skits, or other activities. These hands-on and engaging activities would capture future drivers’ attention, effectively teaching them just how vital drivers’ safety is in preventing countless deaths.

The better the instruction and spread of awareness, the more likely people will consider the consequences of their actions before they endanger themselves and others’ lives. With interactive learning, before drivers think of engaging in unsafe driving habits, they will think back to the information they learned through their activities.