<p>ebeeee - That’s a good point, but not always received very well. I once blew in a kid of a very good friend of mine (I won’t even say what I witnessed…) and absolutely nothing changed. They just don’t want to take those keys away because then they’d have to drive him around I guess.</p>
<p>I’ve been tempted to follow kids home - but I know how poorly that might go over too. Parents suspect their kids are driving badly, but just don’t want to hear it. Even major tickets and traffic violations don’t stop these kids. :(</p>
<p>ebeeeee,
We also have an informal parents network. I have called and told a friend that I saw her son (age 17) talking on his cellphone (illegal in this state) while trying to make a turn. This same child has been stopped by the local police twice for not wearing a seat belt. He has “talked his way out of it” twice, and considers it to be a badge of honor. When I drive with my 15 year old sons, I now point out every driving hazard that I can see, explaining things such as Yield signs, and not assuming that the other driver will follow the rules. This is such a difficult stage of their lives and these tragedies never seem to let up. It is truly a parent’s worst nightmare!</p>
<p>Edit: I was thinking the same thing as you were, Weenie. Sometimes the parents just are happy that they don’t have to chauffeur the kid around anymore. It’s too much of a hassle for the parents to impose any serious consequences, like taking the car away for a month to start.</p>
<p>I wish we could make it stop. My high school lost two within the 12 months of my senior year. I lost a teammate in June of 2006 when he apparently fell asleep and crossed the yellow line into the path of an oncoming semi. Chris went out with a fight-- he destroyed the semi. The trucker tried to avoid the accident and actually rolled the truck. Chris didn’t stand a chance as the impact caused the engine compartment of his minivan to end up in the back seat! He was headed to football weight lifting at 7:20 AM.</p>
<p>The second one came in the spring. April or May I remember because I was at school that night preparing for an academic assembly when our assistant principal told us. A sophomore had gotten behind the wheel on the way home from school and it was raining. She, her step-sister, and a couple friends were in the car when it caught a slick patch, went off the road, and then came back onto the road into the path of another car. Her step-sister, sitting in the passenger seat, was killed in the accident.</p>
<p>My dad teaches Drivers’ Education at the high school. He had both of those students behind the wheel. I know with Chris he cried a lot as did all of us. That funeral was definitely hardest thing I’ve ever been a part of.</p>
<p>Drivers’ Ed in the state of Illinois is required of all drivers under the age of 18. My dad has had to actually take licenses away from students who moved from states where it is not required. The student must hold the permit for 9 months now (was 90 days) and they are required to have 50 hours driving with their parents (10 at night). It used to be 25. There is talks of making it 100 hours. Also, 6 hours Behind the Wheel with an instructor. Our school has 3 cars.</p>
<p>I wish the GDL laws were enforced. Fatal accidents involving teens here in NJ seem to always involve kids being in violation of the GDL rules. Police should pull over cars with numerous kids and do random checks. If they’re in violation they should lose their driving priviledges until 18, no excuses.</p>
<p>I’m so sorry, jym and can hear your grief right through cyberspace.</p>
<p>We named our son after a teen cousin who had recently died (cultural custom to name babies this way) as the driver in a terrible car accident, not his fault, just terrible bad fortune. Rather than impose bad luck on our kid, we found he thought about this a lot growing up and certainly does his best today with driving. His mother took up photography again to cope. Currently her only other son is about to become a dad for the first time, after not marrying until age 30. It’s been a long road for her, that’s for sure, but of all the Moms who deserve to be grandma’s she’s high on my list.</p>
<p>Again, my condolences are to your family this sad day.</p>
<p>I am sorry to hear of this loss. It really concerns me that so many young people are killed in driving accidents.<br>
I don’t know what the solution is. I know my son feels invincible and has driven too fast and recklessly. In fact, he just spent a night in jail for exceeding the speed limit (by a lot) on an interstate in a very strict state. I wish I could tell you that he learned his lesson, but he seems to feel that this was an excessive penalty for “just speeding” and that any other county and/or any other state would not have done this. His mentality is not unique to him, which puts all of us and our other wonderful kids in danger.<br>
There are so many causes of teen driving deaths- inexperience, a momentary bad decision, recklessness, alcohol… Our state does not require drivers’ ed and has seriously cut funding for school programs. I attended a class (for my own speeding ticket) which was actually excellent and the instructor was a huge advocate of simply SLOWING DOWN.</p>
<p>Illinois requires Drivers’ Ed in the schools I think. My dad said that having two major car insurance agencies located in central Illinois will help to keep it a requirement.</p>
<p>This is the defensive driving program both of my guys did <a href=“http://www.carcontrol.com/[/url]”>http://www.carcontrol.com/</a> They really found it fun. The also took a week if in-class traditional (private) drivers ed and on-the-road lessons with the drivers ed program as well. Gotta love those dual sets of brakes. The cool thing about the car control clinic program is that you do it in your own car- so you learn the maneuvers and defensive tactics in your own vehicle. Makes sense. </p>
<p>Both my guys have been in accidents- fortunately only the car was injured. Older s had a situation like chaucers_pal (see post #17) where a car in front of him stopped before he realized it. He was fine. Car was toast. Younger son was on the highway, had stoppped due to an accident. The car behind him also stopped. The tractor trailer behind him did not. Fortunately again, both boys are ok. Cars are replaceable.</p>
<p>MOWC- glad to hear WC survived his day in jail. Wish it meant more than it sounds like it did. Maybe he’s just keeping that to himeslf… maybe…</p>
<p>jym,
I’m so sorry for you and your friend’s family. I want to thank you for bringing this topic to the parent cafe’. What an important topic.
The law in MA says that my son will be eligible for a permit at 16. There is no way that he’s ready for that responsibility. My eldest D was and we never had a problem. D2 was not and frankly, she was afraid. I don’t blame her, the roads around here are very unforgiving and the drivers are very often impatient and lead footed.
We all look for reasons when these things happen. Your friend’s son sounds like a smart kid who made a mistake. I’m so sorry for your loss.</p>
<p>I’m very sorry. This is something you never really expect.</p>
<p>I am not certain to the extent that education will or won’t help. This is not something I, or really anyone, could measure at this time. But I guess I don’t see how it isn’t worth a shot. </p>
<p>I’m 18 and I don’t have a license. I want to, but it’s hard. I try really hard on the (admittedly few) occasions I drive with my parents, but it seems so overwhelming. My goal is to get it soon but who knows. I guess right now it’s not that big a deal since I can’t have a car here anyway and I wouldn’t have anyplace to drive even if I did. </p>
<p>Anyway, I’ve been in a serious car accident (driving with a parent). It wasn’t our fault; and the other driver was very young. Everyone was more or less okay, but the car was totaled. Would have been worse if I was on the passenger side instead of the back seat behind the driver (at 16! My dad’s helicoptering pays off! I’m joking now but it’s serious. I would have at least sustained serious head injuries). The driver ran a light that had been red for some time and failed to brake when she hit our car, which pushed us over two lanes of traffic and up onto a sidewalk, luckily not a peak time, or it would have been worse. I guess the stars were aligned or something. I hate driving with friends. I oftentimes feel they take unnecessary risks, and I’m not too “cool” to point it out (I only drive with my best friends). I don’t care if they think backseat driving is annoying, I’m not going to let them kill someone because they think they might just make it. </p>
<p>What I’m getting at is that they just don’t understand. They literally don’t feel the same things I do. When a car is coming up on an access road I flinch but they don’t even pay attention. So what happens if that car fails to stop? Kids aren’t looking around and trying to react because they haven’t had the experience of someone failing to stop. One of my friends who was the worst offender of speeding, risky driving, not terrible but I wouldn’t drive with her anymore towards the end, well it caught up with her. Thankfully she paid very superficially - car was totaled, she got taken off insurance, cuts and bruises, scared, etc. One of the first times she saw me after, guess what she said? “I’m sorry. Now I know exactly how you felt.” </p>
<p>So I can’t help but think more experience is key. Do you think the first responders who come out to these accident scenes every day are the ones going around doing all this crazy stuff? Is it the adults who have driven past numerous accidents? Young people are being disproportionately affected here, and I’d like to think we could make up that lack of experience some way other than them narrowly surviving a fatal accident. Because some aren’t going to survive. I don’t know what the disconnect is, but for some reason even losing friends doesn’t seem to be enough to have a long term change on behavior.</p>
<p>I’m so glad about the graduated lisencing laws; I think the best thing my state ever did was to make it illegal for teens to drive with non-relatives under the age of 21 in the car for 6 months. This past summer I can hardly remember any of these tragic stories on the news; not long ago it seemed to be an epidemic.</p>
<p>That said, we’ll never completely get rid of teen driving deaths, because kids think they’re invincible. The death of a teen scares the kids who know them, but in 3 or 4 years those kids have moved on and another group comes in thinking they’re invincible. We lost a senior girl in our high school who had just been voted “Most Likely to Brighten Your Day,” her friend was driving the speed limit on the way from school to their after-school job on a secondary road, but it was snowing and the car hit an ice patch and slid into an oncoming SUV. For the next 2 years I knew of kids who took their time getting their lisences, and many parents said their kids gave them no flack at all when they told them they couldn’t drive somewhere in bad weather. Sadly that effect is fading. My younger child’s class CAN’T WAIT to get their liscences!</p>
<p>Unfortunately, the only way to get experience is to do something. The only way to learn to drive is to drive. We will always have inexperienced drivers on the road. Hopefully parents will enforce the number of hours needed to get a lisence, and the graduated lisencing/junior operator laws. I think they really help if parents will ENFORCE them.</p>
<p>^^^Agree wholeheartedly about parents enforcing the law. In our state the provisional license the kids get at 16 requires them to have no more than 1 person under 21 in the car with them and they must be off the road by 9pm.</p>
<p>H and I enforced it with a vengence and both boys complied (not always happily) but we saw many of their friends out driving way past the curfew with bunches of kids. One of the parents told me that they didn’t enforce the rule and if the kid got caught they were only hurting themselves because that would just put getting their full license off for another 6 months…amazing.</p>
<p>First of all, Prince, thank you for sharing your feelings and concerns. You have every right to be nervous about driving yourself and w/friends & I really appreciate your sharing your experiences with us.
As far as driving experience is concerned, I think that it’s very important but not the only factor involved. My brother started teaching his kids to drive when they were 12. They live on a big farm and were driving a pickup at the age of 14. His kids are definately confident behind the wheel and can back up a trailer w/o a problem, but they’re still teen aged boys. They are almost too confident behind the wheel and take many risky chances. My D’s refuse to drive w/them. Speeding tickets have not detered them. Insurance prices go up? Oh well. They aren’t paying for it. It gives me no comfort knowing that these young men are experienced drivers. There is more to it than that.
Many parents here ignore the under 21 laws, they don’t want to be put out. I wonder if they think about how much they would be put out if they had a teen with a brain injury or with a broken neck.</p>
<p>jym,
I am so sorry for this young man’s family, and for you – life has been piling it on lately. Senigng thoughts and prayers for all young drivers and the ones who love them.</p>
<p>jym, my condolences to you. We’ve been through this with a couple of kids from high schools my Ds have attended. It’s so very sad, and also infuriating. There is recently enacted legislation in Ontario which will address the issue of speed, as well as street racing, whereby the offenders will have their licenses and cars immediately impounded for seven days, and, if convicted, an increase in fines to a minimum of $2000 to a maximum of $10,000, if they’re travelling at 50 km/31 mi. an hour over the posted limit. </p>
<p>The new law also has stipulations, and the same penalties, which apply to unsafe lane changes, tailgating, not driving with respect to the road conditions, and cutting off other drivers. The law was passed as a direct result of several horrific fatal accidents caused by excessive speed and racing over the past year. This obviously applies to all drivers but the impetus for this legislation was the issue of young male drivers speeding and driving dangerously. In the first week, approximately 300 cars were impounded. Sadly, two of those were after a five car accident caused by two young brothers racing, where two innocent women were killed.</p>
<p>For those who told me that telling parents when their kid were driving recklessly wouldn’t be well received…I could care less how it is received. I look at it this way. I am nice about the way I tell them, how they receive it is up to them. I don’t call parents I don’t know and I would not do it more than once on the same kid.<br>
If one of those kids is in a fatal accident, at least I will feel I said something.
I also force my kids to obey the graduated law in our state that requires no driving after a certain time and no kids in the car.<br>
My kids know if they do not obey those rules, they will not be driving. And of course, if I have to drive them somewhere, I WILL lean out the window, yell “goodbye sweetie, give mommy a kiss” etc.<br>
They have never pushed the rule.<br>
Anyway, I know we can’t stop everything that could potentially happen to them but I at least want to know that I was willing to parent my kid and to be a responsible citizen when I see something that is not right. Nuff said, that’s my two cents (and that’s probably what its worth).</p>
<p>I’m also sorry for the loss of your friend.</p>
<p>I have to say that as someone who was once a 16 y/o teenaged boy driving, in retrospect I did things that would have curled my parents’ hair had they known. I won’t go into the details here but as others pointed out what a teenaged boy ‘knows’ he ‘should’ do and what he actually does are two different things. They possess the dangerous mix of teenaged boy bravado, thrill-seeking, and perceived invincibility together with inexperience in something that can be very deadly on even the first mistake. </p>
<p>But in addition to driver’s ed, required driving hours, and graduated DLs which states like California have, there is new technology that can at least assist. These devices monitor the driving style and habits of the person driving the car and can be reviewed later. I remember seeing a documentary on the subject and some of the parents who believed their teenaged boys and girls were conscientious and safe drivers were astounded to see what really happened - from boys speeding, ‘drifting’, and passing unsafely to girls talking excessively on the phone and not paying much attention to driving. The monitors are a bit of ‘big brother’ but they at least provide the feedback of what happens once their seemingly safe teenaged driver turns the corner and is out of sight.</p>