Learning How to Drive Safe Never Stops

Learning
How to Drive Safe Never Stops

Driving
is a privilege. It’s not a right nor something everyone is entitled
to, it is a privilege that must be earned through doing it safely.
Every year, tens of thousands of people die in car related accidents.
Many of these deaths can be prevented through safer driving
practices, and the first step to these safer practices is driver
education.

Knowing
the rules of the road is one of the most important steps to being
safe on the road. Understanding road signs, rights of way, and
traffic laws is the best way to avoid violating them and causing
lethal accidents. Thus, the basic understanding of driving that
drivers ed imparts to people is very important to keep them
driving safely. Teaching rules and regulations however, is not the
only thing drivers ed can do. Personally, in my drivers ed.
class, part of my education was statistics about deaths while
driving. Videos, lectures, and examples of deaths caused by unsafe
driving really drove home that driving is a dangerous action when not
taken seriously. One point my instructor put an emphasis on was
texting while driving, which leads into my next topic.

Every
day, I see people text and drive. Be it friends or parents, I’m
exposed to the action on a daily basis. This form of distracted
driving leads to many driving accidents and deaths. One particular
day a few years ago, I was getting a ride from a senior on the girls’
basketball team. I was in the back seat, but still able to see her
text as she drove a car full of high school girls. While on the
highway, she tried to change lanes while texting. She almost hit
another car and swerved largely, causing more than one of the girls
to panic. Afterwards, everyone tried to laugh it off, but I still
remember how scary it was to be in a car where the driver wasn’t
fully focused on the road. It is that memory that encourages me to
take steps to make myself and drivers around me drive more safely.

I
have been driving for a little over one year, and not once have I
attempted to text and drive. Whenever I am in someone else’s car, I
make it a rule that they do not mess with their phone while they
drive, and if they try to counter me, I refuse to ride with them. It
only takes small steps to make you and the people you know drive more
safely, but those small steps could save people’s lives.