Driver’s Education Essay

I’ve known many people, including myself, who have complained about how long the driver’s education course is. The importance of these hours spent studying and practicing can easily go in one ear and out the other, leaving behind careless and dangerous drivers. Driver’s education is extremely important when it comes to reducing the number of deaths on roads every year as you don’t just learn how to drive, but you learn all the important safety concepts as well. A major safety concept that is taught during driver’s education is defensive driving and how to be aware of your surroundings while operating a vehicle. Defensive driving teaches you how to avoid potentially dangerous situations and how to react to other people on the road. One of my favorite things that I was taught while learning about defensive driving was the phrase, “Always know where you can get out.” This means that you should always know where you can go if a dangerous situation comes upon you. Driver’s education also teaches about the importance of not drinking and driving. According to the NHTSA, drinking and driving kills 28 people per day in the United States. That number needs to go down and the only way to reasonably work towards that goal is to spread awareness about drinking and driving, as well as planning on getting other modes of transportation after a night of drinking. Another step that can be taken to reduce the number of deaths related to driving is spreading awareness about the dangers of texting and driving. According to the NHTSA, 3,142 people were killed in 2020 in motor vehicle accidents involving distracted drivers. Driver’s education also has a section that talks about the dangers of texting and driving and how to avoid it. The best way for us to be able to reduce the number of accidents on the road is to increase awareness about these issues and to also be conscious of our own decisions, so we don’t happen to make fatal decisions.

In my life I have been in three car accidents. One when I was in sixth grade and the other two were more recent and I was driving. The first one occurred as my dad and I were on the highway on our way to a Christmas party for my soccer team. All of a sudden, we hit stop and go traffic that makes my younger self groan as I don’t want to be late to the party. Then, wham, I’m jolted forward as the minivan that was behind us suddenly slams into the rear bumper of our pickup truck. It took me a second to realize what had happened as being in a car accident was something foreign to me at the time. I remember getting out of the car and seeing the whole front bumper of the minivan that hit us hanging toward the ground and the dents that it put in the back end of our truck. Luckily there was no lasting damage to the truck and nobody got hurt, but it was a situation that could have easily been prevented if the person behind us had realized that they needed to put on the brakes. The second accident that I was in occurred in a parking lot after picking up dinner. It was a normal day and my sister and I had just walked out of Jimmy John’s where we got our dinner from. I backed out of my parking spot and was about to put my truck into drive when I saw in my rearview mirror the car behind me start to back out. The other person backed into my truck and caused a small collision in that parking lot. Once again, nobody was hurt and there was little damage but it shows that you should always be aware of your surroundings. The third accident that I was in occurred on my way to school. There is a stop sign right before you get to my school on the main road that goes past it, and right before the stop sign always gets backed up in the mornings. Once again as I was driving through the stop and go traffic, the person behind me forgets to put on the brakes and runs into my rear bumper. I was able to easily pull over and exchange information with the guy who hit me and still make it to school, but it left me thinking about the importance of being aware of your surroundings when driving.

Personally, the step I can take to become a better and safer driver is to remember not to pick up my phone while driving. I got into a bad habit of answering texts while the traffic lights are red and it is a habit that I need to break. Trying to finish up the last word of a text message as the light turns green is way less important than the safety of myself and others around me. In the future I will be working on breaking that habit, remembering to stay aware of my surroundings, and helping others remember that as well.