Wednesday, September 27, 2000

By AMY RILEY
One Citizen's Perspective

Parents everywhere live with an underlying dread, a mind-numbing whisper of foreboding, that they will one day get that call in the night the call that will shatter their world when it reveals to them that their child has been involved in a terrible accident.

Parents of two Cobb County students lived just that nightmare this past weekend when another tragic car crash took the lives of two youths in the upswing of their lives.

Fayette County has seen its share of vehicular tragedy, too. No community is immune. Some high-profile teenage crashes led to passage of House Bill 681 in the 1997 Georgia General Assembly. The "Teenage and Adult Driver Responsibility Act" mandated provisional licenses for 16-year-olds, and stiff penalties and suspensions for motor vehicle violations. There has also been a renewed interest in drivers education courses as parents, law enforcement, and school systems see a clear need for more in-depth training of new drivers. For parents, this is welcome relief.

Mickey Littlefield, a Fayette County Board of Education member and parent of teenagers, "knows that this can save lives." In the insurance business himself, Mr. Littlefield has seen the statistics on inexperienced drivers. He would like to see drivers education become a regular elective again, like it was for many of today's parents when they were in school.

Unfortunately, academic schedules are so tight that some students with solid grade averages are attending summer school just to get in needed academic course work. About the best we can do for now is to continue to offer drivers education training as a service of our Community School.

Many Fayette parents are taking advantage of the 36-hour course offered quarterly for a fee of $195. The 30 hours of classroom instruction and six hours of on-the-road driving with a certified instructor is well worth it, and smart parents know that the fee might be offset by discounted insurance rates for students who have completed the course. While the fall courses are all full, the Community School office will take up to 100 names on a waiting list for the next available sessions.

The Community School also offers a shorter course in defensive driving which is geared to recently permitted 15-year-olds, but is available to all Fayette residents desiring to enhance their driver skills.

This six-hour course is a great place to start with young drivers, and a valuable source of information and skills for those awaiting an opening in the certified 36-hour course. The fee for this class is $25. Parents may contact the Fayette County Community School at 770-460-3990, ext. 470.

Many may remember the mad rush to enroll students in the summer months, and the realization that we have greater need than we have spaces available. This time it isn't the classroom space we need, but certified instructors and vehicles.

Southtowne Motors of Newnan provides the Fayette County school system with six vehicles for driver education courses. In a gesture of partnership and community service, these vehicles are made available and swapped out every 5,000 miles. The previously driven vehicles are then sold at a reduced rate to car purchasers.

Parents of children who have passed the certified driver training course can get an additional discount for purchasing one of the drivers education vehicles with proof of course completion.

Any citizen, subject to certification and background check by the Georgia Department of Public Safety, may qualify to teach the drivers ed course by completing an application and a 36-hour training course themselves. Interested citizens may call Carol Cuendet at 404-624-7799.

The Driver Responsibility Act and a renewed emphasis on drivers education does seem to be reducing the rates of fatal crashes involving teenagers, even though high profile exceptions might suggest otherwise. According to Major Wayne Hannah of the Fayette County Sheriff's Department, citing the 1999 Georgia Highway Safety Factbook, "the crash rate per 1000 licensed drivers ages 16-17 decreased 35.1 percent from the first half to the second half of 1997." While these rates might differ some today, the sense is that education is key to producing safe drivers.

Maj. Hannah states emphatically, "You could delay getting the license until the driver is 17, and that's part of it, but you've got to teach them how to drive." According to Maj. Hannah, the biggest culprit is inexperience, predominantly in terms of "how to maintain control of the vehicle."

Board member Mickey Littlefield echoed those sentiments. "The scariest day in a parent's life is not when you pack them off to college it's when you hand them the keys to the car." And to parents everywhere, one senseless death is one too many. It's the pain that, for every parent, hits uncomfortably close to home.

[Your comments are welcome: ARileyFreePress@aol.com.]

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