Drivers Ed and Traffic School

Distracted and reckless driving has become more significant in today’s generation than previous ones. Due to the invention of the cell phone and touch screen radios, people are paying less attention on the road and more on these growing technologies. When people aren’t focusing on the road, accidents happen that cause serious harm and even death. While I have not experienced a loss of a loved one due to distracted driving, I have been in a serious car accident due to distracted driving. Going through my road of recovery, both mentally and physically, has made me hyper aware of every outcome when I’m driving.

After my car accident, the physical toll was immediate and hard to ignore. I had bruises, cuts, and muscle pains that stayed for days and even weeks. Simple tasks, like getting out of bed and walking to the bathroom, was a slow and painful journey. While I wasn’t seriously injured to the point of physical therapy, I had to learn to be patient with my body. I wasn’t going to heal overnight, like I wished I could, and had to learn to listen to my body in order to heal appropriately.

The car accident had affected me most mentally. After the shock of being in the accident, and having to drive for the first time since it happened, I was overcome with anxiety. Driving down the street or to the grocery store, I was always thinking about the cars that were distracted, reckless, and didn’t understand the rules of the road. How any one of those cars could run into me at any moment and I would have to go through the physical pain again. This anxiety made it difficult to focus on driving due to always thinking about the “what if” scenarios. Knowing that I had these mental blocks, I sought help. They helped me work through these issues and feel comfortable again in driving.

As a person who has been driving for 7 years, I have been guilty of the occasional checking of the phone when stopped at a red light or changing a song playing on the aux cord while driving. After getting in the accident, I’ve been focused every single minute I am in a car, even if I’m not the one driving. If I’m not focused on the road and the others around me, I could become a statistic involving distracted driving. There are drivers behind the wheel that don’t care about others on the road. They believe that if they drive recklessly it falls on the other drivers to watch out. But when everyone has this mindset, every driving situation becomes a distracted and reckless one.

Being an educator, addressing distracted driving to young drivers is incredibly important. One idea I have to raise awareness of the dangers of distracted driving could be to bring people into driving classes to talk about their experiences. By explaining their fears and mistakes to young drivers, it can help them understand the seriousness of distracted and reckless driving. Knowing that peer influence within younger generations is impactful, it can be used as a solution to distracted driving. Bringing in law enforcement, hospital workers, or victims of distracted driving can influence young drivers to be more aware of their surroundings. These young drivers only get driving education through classes and experiences, it’s important to use all that time to teach them how to be good drivers. We could incorporate programs or a week where these people come into the classroom and share their personal experiences to connect.

Understanding that some young drivers aren’t going to retain these personal stories, putting some kind of regulation on car technology can be beneficial. Some touch screen radios have a regulation feature in their car, however it is easy to bypass and can be coded with games. By making these scenarios harder to obtain and incorporating more safety features on these radios can lessen distracted driving. In regards to smartphones, some have the feature to put the phones in “Do Not Disturb”. However, this feature is voluntary and young drivers may not know that their phone comes equipped with it. Showing young drivers these features and encouraging them to use them can help reduce distracted driving.

Another way that could be used to bring awareness to distracted driving is to utilize social media platforms. These younger generations are addicted to technology and social media. Sometimes the social media content these drivers are watching causes more reckless driving than preventing it. When I go on social media, I see trends of people using their car to create new trends and challenges that are harmful to bystanders if something goes wrong, even if they have it planned out. By using social media campaigns to show the dangers of distracted driving, it can help these young drivers understand how a glance at the phone or participating in these challenges can be harmful. There can be hashtags or challenges to get the younger generations involved. They can also incorporate positive incentives to get people to focus on the road. The local governments can create grants or insurance companies could offer discounts.

In conclusion, distracted driving is a growing issue and leaves behind lasting marks if not properly addressed. Knowing how distracted driving has affected my life, I believe that with more effort to incorporate “Do Not Disturb” mode on smartphones can help prevent distracted driving. By utilizing personal stories from victims, hospital staff, and law enforcement can help young drivers understand that people in cars are real people and not NPC’s (as high schoolers state). By showing young drivers how to use “Do Not Disturb” and using social media in a positive way can also help. As people who have been driving longer than incoming 16 year olds, it’s on the older generations to be part of the solution. With the right tools and mindset, distracted driving can become a rare occurrence instead of something that is expected.