Getting on the road for some teens is a really big deal in life to them. Teens wait for sixteen years before they can legally set foot in the driver's seat of a car. What teens don’t really take into account is the logic behind driving a car. A teenager can be easily misled to different scenarios when they are in the driver’s seat.
Driver safety is very important when a teen is given the role to be the driver for a ride. If the teen does not understand how to handle a flashing red light in a large intersection; they could be putting lives at risk with their decision. When a teen is first given their permit it is likely they have six months until they can even register for their license. Teens are required to get a certain amount of hours in before they can even be alone in a car by themselves. There is the permit test that needs passed before they can even get their permit. This test states the simple rules to follow in the driver’s seat; which every teen should take this test because the answers to those questions are used every time they set foot in the car.
Teens may face difficult decisions when they have to drive somewhere, like taking a friend to the mall. Teens might decide that they want to play music, but only the driver knows what music they like to listen to. The driver may pull out their phone and start searching for music, which causes them to miss a stop sign and go head on in another car. This could be a very dangerous distraction to driving. Teens might constantly feel the need to check their phones when they are going somewhere, because a single text can’t just wait. Now, there are so many different features in cars that could get a teen distracted and killed. The new Tesla’s have their large screen in the front, which can display Netflix movies. The teen might get distracted watching this and cause an accident. Nowadays there are so many more distractions and things to be cautious about with the new and advancing technology.
I have seen many scenarios where teens could have used better logic in situations. Just recently my friend got into a wreck. My friend, was entering on the highway from her house to go to Panera. Where she enters it’s before a bridge. My friend was waiting to merge at the yield sign. There was a car in front of her who started to merge, my friend saw there were no cars coming. She wasn’t paying any attention because as she hit the gas as hard as she could to merge with the incoming traffic she didn’t pay attention that the car in front of her did not merge. She ended up rear ending the back of the car in front of her. She had just gotten her license a few months prior to this situation. It is always important to be aware of the surroundings, even when merging, it is important to make sure there are no cars coming, in front of you, or beside you. This caused her insurance to go up a ton and she now has not been able to drive because of this. If she had used her driving education, she wouldn’t have been in that situation.
There are many ways communities offer education to help with certain situations just like the one I just described. There’s starting to be a lot more talk about driving instructors that the Department of Motor Vehicles offer. There are people hired who you pay in order to get taken out to drive in their car and get tips and tricks. These instructors also go with you to your lessons and make sure you pass. There are also manuals online offered from the permit practice tests online. The whole drivers manual is online and available to anyone to read about the rules on the road. I have been to a drivers safety course, which teaches teens what to do when they are in a last minute situation and not to panic. Such as making quick turns and avoiding objects in the road. This course teaches teens to drive backwards through cones and drive super fast and hit the ABS breaks. Teens may get scared of that noise when they first slam on their breaks, but this course teaches kids that the ABS breaks are there to help you and they aren’t something to be afraid of.