Learning How to Drive as a Senior in Highschool

A couple of months ago, if you asked me for directions to my house, I wouldn’t know what to tell you. I didn’t know the names of streets or interstates, let alone how to navigate them. I never paid attention to pavement markings or traffic signs. I never worried about who would pick me up from school or what would happen if I stayed after school unexpectedly. My mom and dad, who are far too patient, were always the ones to take me to places. While my friends obtained their permits and eventually their licenses, I continued to stay in the back seat of my mom’s car, passing the time idly on my phone. To put it simply, I had no interest in driving.

Unfortunately for me, time has the annoying habit of moving forward. I am no longer an eighth grader with an extraordinarily long spring break. This year, I’m a senior preparing to go to university next year, and my poor mother will not drop me off at campus every week. Something that was once a mild inconvenience in my life is now an immediate priority.

Despite this new sense of urgency, I still dragged and kicked my feet. According to my mother, “I had no interest in driving.” The permit test that should have taken me less than three weeks to study took me the entire summer, and I didn’t spend that extra time reviewing that online handbook for every last detail, if you catch my drift. In fact, most of the time I would idly scroll through the pages using my computer mouse, forget what I just read, and be forced to scroll back up again. Needless to say, I did not take my driver’s education very seriously.

Karma would come in the form of my first driving lesson. I miraculously passed my permit test, but I was not prepared to jump into the driver’s seat. I believe it would be safe to argue that I was completely clueless (and by clueless, I mean I didn’t know where the accelerator pedal was). And despite yelling, “It’s on your right!” my teacher still believed it was fit for me to drive at a 50-mile-per-hour intersection.

It wouldn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how that turned out. To paint the picture, on my first turn, I made a complete stop in rush hour traffic, and the very next turn, I took it as a mission to accelerate into the nearest curb. I was also completely overwhelmed and managed to overlook the fact that I was drifting out of my lane. Hell, I couldn’t even see if cars were behind me because I didn’t adjust my mirrors beforehand (not that I looked at them in the first place). “A total disaster” would not even scratch the surface of how horrible my first lesson was.

At this point, my previous apathy toward driving has evolved into a full-blown fear of driving. I was afraid of driving, and for good reason. I drove extremely irresponsibly, and I acted even more so. I went in completely blind and expected things to work out for me. That would have been fine if it only affected me, but my irresponsible driving could have harmed my teacher, the observer in the back seat, or one of the thousands of people who regularly use the highway transportation system to get to work or school. I behaved more like an irresponsible fourteen-year-old than someone who’s going to head off to college in the next couple of months.

In the days following my first lesson, my mother, horrified to learn that my teacher had thrown me onto a busy intersection without warning, decided to find me a new teacher. Although I was extremely reluctant to begin driving again, she told me that I didn’t really have a choice in the matter. Time still moves forward, and there are fewer months separating the present from my future at college.

The second time around, I was determined to take my driver’s education seriously and not let my anxiety grab a hold of me. I reread my handbook—in person and properly this time. My shift in attitude wasn’t the only thing that changed. My new teacher, a middle-aged Vietnamese woman weathered by life, seemed much more adept at dealing with clueless teenagers like myself.

For my first lesson, she decided it was best that I worked in a low-risk environment. She drove me out to the neighborhood, where I spent an hour and a half with her driving around the neighborhood, practicing my turns. I ran over the curb a couple of times, and I still had trouble controlling my speed, but it was the first time I felt a sense of control over the car.

That sense of control would later extend to other areas of driving, including my awareness. The more I learned how to control my car, the more I was able to focus on my surroundings. The more comfortable I felt with braking and staying in my lane, the more comfortable I felt with taking a quick glance at my mirrors.

My teacher also helped me practice defensive driving. Defensive driving not only takes into account the current dangers but also the future dangers on the road. Unlike normal driving, defensive driving acknowledges that not everyone will drive responsibly on the road, and it takes steps to mitigate the damage done by others’ irresponsible driving.

For example, before I learned how to drive, I was always annoyed at drivers and my own parents for not pressing the throttle immediately after the traffic signal turned green. However, now I know that my parents and those other drivers were practicing defensive driving. They would not be at fault for an accident if a car suddenly ran a red light, but defensive driving allows them to avoid what could potentially be a serious accident. Practicing defensive driving helps me become a safer and better driver. As stated previously, defensive driving can help prevent or mitigate serious accidents, but it also helps manage my anxiety

I realized that my anxiety stemmed from things I couldn’t control. That first lesson, I felt totally out of control. As a result, I began to fear driving. However, defensive driving helped me focus my internal locus on what I could physically control. This helped me become a less anxious driver, which in turn made me a better driver.

Overall, driver’s education helps teenage drivers feel more in control of the car and more aware of their surroundings. These qualities help drivers prepare for any stressful situation they might face on the road and prevent them from making impulsive, uninformed decisions. Instilling these qualities can lead to safer drivers and lower the total number of accidents in an area. Finally, an emphasis on the defensive driving mindset helps reduce the damage done by reckless driving.

Although driver’s education has helped me significantly improve my driving, there are still changes that can be made to improve driver’s education to help reduce the number of crashes and deaths for young drivers.

First, I believe there should be a more rigorous process to obtain a driver’s permit—at least in Texas. As my own experience shows, a teenager in Texas does not have to put in much effort to obtain their permit. As a result, they are less likely to be prepared to take on the responsibilities of driving.

Second, I believe that the theory-based portion of a driver’s education should remain in person instead of online. One reason I was underprepared going into my first lesson was that it was difficult for me to absorb the information from the handbook since it was online. However, I do understand that other students may prefer the more convenient online lessons. Perhaps a good compromise would be to split up the 32-hour theory course all Texas drivers must take into select chunks. Students could complete these chunks by themselves at their own pace, but before they could move on to the next one, they needed to be tested by a teacher in person.

In conclusion, learning how to drive is unavoidable in America. Eventually, most people have to learn how to drive, whether it is for college or work. Despite its commonality, learning how to drive can also be an extremely stressful process and, if done incorrectly, dangerous (especially if you’re an inexperienced teen who had no interest in driving beforehand). Luckily, driver’s education can help that inexperienced teenager regain a sense of control in the car. In turn, they become safer and more responsible drivers.

I have made my fair share of mistakes when learning how to drive. Fortunately for me, my driver’s education was always there to put me on the right track—or steer me into the right lane. Nevertheless, it allowed me to transform a clueless teenager into someone who’s going to register for their first license test soon! Learning how to drive has definitely been an emotional rollercoaster, but I cannot emphasize how much driver’s education has helped me along the way.