Turn Down T-Swift and Focus On the Road

Driving safely is taught to young adults, teens, and adults every day, through online, in-person, and school courses, everyone knows that driving safely is important. Yet, people today still don’t drive safely, causing numerous accidents a day, unnecessary fear of driving for those who drive safely, and thousands of deaths from accidents a year. This can be caused by drinking and driving, blasting music, being distracted by a cell phone, etc. These facts truly emphasize why driving safely is so important.

Driver education is the basis of knowledge you need as a driver to safely drive and be licensed on the road. This is so that when you drive you are protecting yourself from getting severely injured but also protecting others as well. All over the world people are dying every day from an unsafe driver crashing their vehicles, the news shares new stories constantly of breaking news updates of another unsafe driver. In Connecticut specifically, there are over 300 deaths a year, in the U.S. as a whole, there are over 30,000 for an abundance of reasons. Some are as simple as paying too much attention to your music. One second you’re trying to pick which T-Swift song to play next and then you look up and you’re about to rear-end someone because you didn’t see the red light. It’s something so simple, yet so life-altering to yourself and the other driver(s) affected. Driver education emphasizes the point of keeping your phone away while driving. Pick your music before you drive so you’re not tempted to mess with it when you are driving. Now some crashes and deaths are caused by more extreme matters. In many cases, it’s drunk driving or driving under the influence. These cases are drivers making poor decisions of driving when they shouldn’t and it typically ends up in extreme fatal crashes affecting their own life and numerous other lives. This is why driver’s education talks about not driving under the influence so often many think they’ll never do it because it’s stupid, yet so so many people do. Now driver’s education isn’t just scary all the time saying don’t do this or that, but they also talk about what you can do as a driver to reduce the number of deaths on the road.

As a new or old driver, there are many actions you can take to be safe on the road. Some are simple such as obeying traffic laws, not going through lights or stop signs, being respectful of spacing when driving, stopping for pedestrians, etc. Other rules can be a bit more complex. One is being more mindful of what’s around you when you’re driving. There are many moving pieces and parts to drive on the road, whether it’s fast or slow it doesn’t matter. When driving you should always have your full attention on not just what’s in front of you, but also around you. This will ensure lessening the chances of you crashing the car in any kind of way. In some cases though, the rules apply to some people more than others. Such as staying off of your phone when you’re driving. A lot of teens especially today go through driver’s ed agreeing not to use their phone and drive yet they always do anyways. It’s a leading cause of many deaths in the U.S. from car crashes because someone was on their phone. Though the fixes for this are simple, you could leave your phone on the opposite side of the car so you can’t get to it, or in your pocket, so it’s hard to get to when driving, or in a backpack or purse so you can’t reach it. It helps to take away a distraction that causes many deaths and injuries to other drivers out on the road. I know family members of mine that have had to deal with this in the past.

In 2017, my grandparents were driving on the highway when a younger girl in her 20s hit them from behind because she was on her phone. They luckily were okay, but came out with a few injuries which was of course a traumatic moment for them and other family members like myself. It’s hard to see the people you love almost die because of someone that was being completely stupid and didn’t even seem to care about it. In this past month as well, I was following my best friend and boyfriend to Dairy Queen when the car spun out of control and almost was totaled. Everyone was okay as well as the car, but it shows that driving safely is important Unfortunately with this though, driving unsafe happens more often than you think. Though, I try to think of a different side of it. To remind myself of what not to do when driving to keep others safe on the road. You never know when you’re right behind someone’s Mom, or in front of someone’s lifelong best friend. I’ve found that beyond following the rules of the road, staying focused, and being off your phone, you have to remember who society is. You as a driver have to remember that anyone around you has some kind of high importance in someone else’s life that means the world to them. So when you drive you want to think of the people around you as someone you care about greatly that you want to protect. This way you’ll be extra cautious on the road knowing that being safe is the best option.

Driving safely is most definitely harder to teach today than it has been for older generations of people. Though as time goes on many teens see that it’s important to be cautious on the road and be mindful of others around them. Being a safe driver is important not just for the safety of yourself and whos in your car but for the people around you as well.