<p>My d will be “legal” soon (meaning she can legally drive non-family members) and came home from her (year-round) extracurricular activity yesterday with several requests for her to drive others to this activity on an ongoing basis.</p>
<p>I am really not comfortable with this. She will only have had her license for six months, this would include winter driving, and, although she wouldn’t have to go too far out of her way, there are some nasty curves involved (fatal car accident has happened within recent memory at one spot).</p>
<p>Furthermore, she drives a clunker with no air bags.</p>
<p>The same parents have gotten the same kids successfully to this activity for the past two plus years, now suddenly the kids have no way to get there except with my d??</p>
<p>What are your thoughts on this? Am I being ungenerous and too much of a helicopter?</p>
<p>fendrock
when my kids first started to drive, the rule was no kids in the car for 6 months.There’s no way I wanted their new driving skills to be responsible for anyone other than themselves.
Its an easy one for the kids to “blame” on the parents.Household rule, noone else in the car for 6 months.
To me you are no being “helicopterish” you are being smart, and letting your kid develop driving skills w/o distraction.</p>
<p>I think it’s fine to veto this. Driving is dangerous. We’re talking about a kid with very little driving experience getting in a car with several teens, who may or may not respect that your daughter is a new driver. Your daughter needs to concentrate on the road, not giggling girls in the backseat, random screams and outbursts, or choosing music. Put a group of teens together, and you’re also more likely to get stupid decisions. If pressured, would your daughter speed, pass a car unsafely, take a “shortcut,” or even drink and drive? Lastly, she’s not in a safe vehicle. If your daughter were in an accident while driving and one of the girls in the car were killed, she would be emotionally wrecked and liable. Car accidents like those can ruin lives. I know a boy who recently got out of jail after a car accident killed his girlfriend while he was driving a group of teens.</p>
<p>If I were the other parents, I certainly wouldn’t be encouraging my teen to get in a car with a new driver. That sounds pretty stupid.</p>
<p>Cathymee, I think her state had the 6-month rule as well. She said her daughter has been driving for 6 months and is now legally allowed to drive non-family members.</p>
<p>I especially appreciated hearing from corranged, as she is closer to being my d’s contemporary.</p>
<p>I too think of how horrible it would be if my daughter were driving and there was a bad accident – it would be devastating even if she were not at fault.</p>
<p>And that is also a good point about what are parents thinking to want to sign up for a new driver – although of course it is very convenient for them to not have to drive.</p>
<p>There was a show about this on my drive to work about an insurance institute trying to get driving ages raised to 17 or 18. They have stats to show much better teen death rates when driving ages are increased. There seem to be a lot of good practices on lowering accident rates and requiring more practice time with a mature driver and not allowing other distractions (other teens) in the car help.</p>
<p>What I did when my boys started driving (and they HATED it!!!)was call the parents of the kids that wanted a ride and ask if the parents were aware and comfortable with their kid riding with a new driver. Surprisingly some said no and thanked me for calling. Others said thanks and approved it.</p>
<p>In California, the rule has changed to year instead of 6 months and you can get a ticket if caught.</p>
<p>I told my daughter that there were DMV rules and my rules, and they were often different. The DMV said she could drive at night, drive friends, and drive on freeways long before I said she could. Actually, I held onto the no-freeway rule for a little too long. She mentioned it at school one day and everyone was incredulous - and then a student teacher, age 25 and owner of her own car - commented that her mom still wouldn’t let her drive in the snow. I relaxed the no-freeway rule and offered to call the student teacher’s mom.</p>
<p>You are right to be concerned. I was at the doctor’s office recently and came across a Reader’s Digest article about young drivers (my son just go this license last month). Reseach has shown that for every additional passenger with a teen driver, the chances of an accident increase dramatically. I’ll try to find it.</p>
<p>I lost both my brothers (at ages 16 and 17) in separate accidents involving teen drivers.</p>
<p>When my own kids reached driving age, my husband and I didn’t allow them to have passengers for six months after they got their licenses (and after that it was on a per case basis.) We also didn’t allow them to ride with other newly licensed drivers. </p>
<p>my D doesn’t have her license yet, but I am very restrictive in letting her be a passenger with “new drivers” There is a time period after getting their license that they can only drive with one passenger. I don’t let her go with anyone who hasn’t had their license at least 3 months, and then I weigh the experience level of the individual and the number of passengers. For the most part, there are drivers who I know have been driving a lot and I let her be a single passenger with them. Only a handful of times have I ok’ed a multi-passenger situation. I would much rather H or I go out of the way and drive her than having an unsafe situation.</p>
<p>One of her sports has a lot of travel involved and they really pressure the parents to allow kids to get rides from each other as they don’t have enough bus transportation. Last year I said no way even though she was one of the older kids on the bus. This year I filled out the official form with no permission, but have told the coach she is allowed to ride with one specific kid who I trust and know doesn’t take other passengers.</p>
<p>When she gets her license, I will have rules just as strict but will also be able to adjust with a better knowledge of the driver (her) over her friends. </p>
<p>There are so many teen driving accidents in the papers, I am really leaning towards the better safe than sorry than I do in most situations.</p>
<p>I will also note that in my D’s circle our stance is very much not the norm. Last year a group went out to ice cream during a snow storm. This group involved one driver with a license for a week, one driver with a license with a month taking a passenger, and my D who was driven by us and only given the ok when we felt the roads were good enough to drive on. Couldn’t believe it.</p>
<p>fendrock, we have had similar situations here too, so I know how you feel. My daughter isn’t allowed to drive friends, and for the first year even with cell phone or radio on. Maybe I’m the big bad mom as far as her friends are concerned, but I’m protecting them too. I’ve read that accident rates are way up when teen drivers have passengers in the car. Especially when she was a new driver, I didn’t want her being distracted by her cell phone ringing, or music playing.</p>
<p>calreader–funny—It reminded me that I didn’t drive on one of the major highways (less than 2 miles from my hometown) until age 25 by choice. It’s a pretty notorious road in the Chicago area. I only did so at that time because I had to get to my GF’s funeral on time. A year later it made up a big part of my commute. </p>
<p>Our state also has a law regarding teens driving teens–6 months I think. We didn’t allow D to drive friends until that point. Even then it was limited to just a couple of other kids in the car. We were very strict about letting her get in the car with other teen drivers and had to approve of her rides. She is permitted to drive on a highway, but it’s not like major highways in large cities. I didn’t realize until recently that some parents in the area don’t let their children drive on it. We feel it’s a better option for her than the twisty, curving back roads she would need to utilize otherwise, especially at night. During the winter we make daily decisions about driving in snow/ice. A couple of times DH and I have driven to her school so that one of us could drive her home and the other could drive the second car home. </p>
<p>DS starts driver’s ed later this month. I’m not ready for another teen driver!</p>
<p>My d is young for her class and so one of the last to get her license.</p>
<p>I did permit her to drive with friends on an “as needed” basis once they were legal – although I was very anxious about it at first.</p>
<p>I guess my nerves can take local driving with friends now and then, but I don’t think I’m ready to step up to her being responsible for driving someone on a regular basis.</p>
<p>She is going to a concert this weekend for the first time (Rascal Flatts), and I am anxious about that as well. (College student brother is driving his high school age sister and a few friends.)</p>
<p>California is now a full year with no other kids in the car - including siblings. We (my wife and I) enforced that rule fully - e.g. told DS that he would lose driving for a year if we caught him breaking that rule - that it would not take the courts. Yes we were known as mean parents but he has now been driving for more than 2 years safely. </p>
<p>There is no way I would want my child driving kids from school to practice/other activities. The energy that is pent up following school creates an additional distraction for a new driver that is IMHO just too much. Better safe than sorry.</p>
<p>I also echo the comment - consider getting a different car if at all possible. Used cars with front and side airbags are widely available and you may find that you can trade down in size in exchange for better safety.</p>
<p>My sons were never allowed to have multiple passengers in the car until they were in college. They could give one friend a ride, if needed, but it had to be from someplace to someplace, not just driving around. The were occasionally permitted to take a ride home with someone on a case by case basis. However, that was usually home from school activities, and since we live 1/2 mile from school, it was just as easy for us to go get them ourselves.</p>
<p>fendrock,
I have twin sons who passed their road tests a couple of weeks ago. Our rules are stricter than the DMV rules. NO passengers except for each other until we say so, which will probably be at least a year down the road. They know that I will find out if they violate the rule. I think that the parents you are talking about are developing a sudden streak of laziness and you should not give in to this pressure.</p>
<p>We were always pretty strict about this and our HS supported that by requiring written permission from both parents for any kids driving together to or from school or school events. It cleared out a lot of issues and there were few accidents in this crowd.</p>
<p>DD is an excellent driver and was from day one, but so many kids she knew got tickets or totaled cars in the first two years of driving, it was just crazy- this was kids at our old school, not the new small one with the mega rules.</p>
<p>Our daughters are not allowed to ride with other kids in high school. With our older daughter, we drove her everywhere until she got her license. We didn’t want her to get rides with friends to/from parties. Her junior prom date didn’t want to go for a test drive with me, our daughter didn’t get in the car with him. Her senior prom date offered before I asked.</p>