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Education Law

: Edjurist

Putting the Brakes on Drivers Ed.

By Justin Bathon

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Not that long ago my cousin, who was 17, had not went to the driver's facility to get his license even though he had passed driver's ed. and everything else that was necessary to get the license. He just didn't want it - he didn't need it he would say. My whole extended family was sort of shocked by this development, but we wrote it off as just a quirk.

Well, according to today's SF Gate, it might be a trend. In California only 14% of 16 year olds have driver's licenses:

In San Francisco, the school board's two student delegates initiated the effort to drop the graduation requirement.

"We believe driver's education should be more of an option," said Nestor Reyes, a sophomore at June Jordan School for Equity, adding that students are carrying full loads to fulfill college entrance requirements. "Most of them haven't taken driver's education because of time."

Like the Lowell students, teens nowadays appear to be in no hurry to get behind the wheel of a car.

There is also little interest in offering driver's ed. as a course:

In 1990, the state pulled the funding that paid for the driver's training, and almost overnight, the behind-the-wheel instruction was eliminated.

At the time, 250,000 students in 950 high schools got driver's training. Last year, only 440 students in seven high schools - mostly in rural areas - got the training.

The state still requires classroom-based driver's education, but that law is largely ignored, with only 1 in 4 California high schools offering the course.

My cousin eventually broke down and got his license when he was 18 and had a girlfriend, but even today he doesn't drive very much. This is a really interesting development if it is happening nationwide. The price of gas and all the additional driving restrictions may not be affecting the generation that is addicted to cars, but it might be affecting the new generations that are not yet addicted. Guess things are just not like they used to be: