We allow teens to get their licenses at an earlier age than in most countries, and little driving experience typically is required before licenses are issued. This is not very smart on our part considering that according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 16 year olds have the highest percentage of crashes-involving speeding, the highest percentage of single vehicle crashes, the highest percentage of crashes with driver error, and the highest vehicle occupancy (NHTSA ). Compared with older drivers, teenagers as a group are more willing to t

What can parents do? As a parent, one of the most important things you can do for your teenage driver is to spend as much time as possible helping them to mature behind the wheel. Parents should discourage the teen from allowing friends to ride along in the car with them or limit the number aloud to ride until they have had enough supervised practice. Insist that they are to wear seat belts at all times. Limit your teen’s driving during high-risk times of the day and limit the area a teen can drive. Set curfews for your teen and encourage your teen to use good judgement. Parents can also use 4MYTEEN, a teen driver's monitoring service. Designed by Officer Tom H. Deats of the Arlington Police Department, this tactic uses a bumper sticker which reads “HOW’S MY DRIVING—CALL 1 800-4MY-TEEN”, and is placed on the car that the teenager uses. This encourages other motorist and pedestrians to call the number and report how the teen is driving, good and bad. “Teens who complete an entire year with 3 or less complaints are eligible to compete for a scholarship, which can be applied toward the teen’s college education(4MYTEEN ).”

Another program that has recently been introduced to the United States is “Graduated Licensing”. This program is doing extremely well and has had a positive effect on teen driving. Graduated Licensing is a conditional or intermediate license given to teens between a learner’s permit and a regular license. “This system was designed to introduce beginning drivers to progressively more extreme driving conditions (nhtsa).” Graduated licensing has firm restrictions and laws that must be followed by the new driver. Including six months of crash free and conviction free driving, a zero tolerance for blood alcohol concentration, and no driving between midnight and 6 a.m. without authorization . The hours between 9 p.m. to 6a.m are the most common time for accidents involving teenagers, “accounting for forty-one percent of teenage automobile accidents in 1997(CNN).” The program also uses color code licenses and a mandatory successful completion of a driver education course. Some violations can be waived depending on the circumstances if the teen writes a 3 thousand word essay on safe driving. “There are three stages in graduated licensing: a supervised learners period; an intermediate license (after passing the driver test) limiting unsupervised driving in high risk situations, and a full privilege driver’s license given only after the first two stages are completed” (NHTSA). The NCUTLO (The National Committee on Uniform Traffic Laws and Ordinances) model law calls for a minimum of six months in the learner stage and a minimum of six months in the intermediate stage with night driving restrictions. A new driver also has restrictions on the amount of passengers allowed at a given time and the beginning driver must drive a minimum number of hours before they can receive their license. All beginners need time to sharpen their skills and this program gives just that. Driving is a skill that is harder to acquire than most teens think and they cannot learn how

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Approximate Word count = 2157
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)