Driving School Blog

Happy Fourth of July! Whether you will be staying near your home or heading out of town for the holiday, we at I Drive Smart hope you have a relaxing break from work and a healthy amount of fun with family and friends. We also hope everyone is safe and recovering well from the terential storms we had a few nights ago. Hopefully, as power gets restored around the area, life can start to get back to normal.

I'd like to take a little time to salute one of our own at IDS. Krista Kennedy, a Montgomery County police officer and one of our "superstar" instructors, was recently featured in an article about Title IX in The Gazette (you can find the article here. Thanks to Title IX, being able to play sports allowed her to stay in peak shape and taught her a number of invaluable life lessons. While most kids are concerned with scoring goals and winning games, many are oblivious to the life skills that they are learning just by participating. In Officer Kennedy's own words, "sports help buld confidence. It helps you socially, teaches you how to interact with people and how to work as a team". These skills - confidence, competence, and teamwork - can help you in school, in social settings, and at work. So if you are a young man and woman, and considering whether to sign up or try out for a team, we say give it a shot. Gaining those skills, you'll be winning just by playing.

One area you may not realize that exposure to sports is particularly helpful is on the road. Many people make the mistake of thinking that driving is a solitary activity. If you are one of those people, I invite you to come see how solitary it is on the Beltway during rush hour. Instead, all the lessons that Officer Kennedy gained from sports are profoundly important while learning to drive. You need a high confidence to make split-second decisions behind the wheel. Moreover, you need to learn how to effectively and beneficially communicate with other drivers on the roadway. This does not mean knowing how to honk your horn! Each year, thousands of accidents and collisions are avoided because drivers are able to effectively signal problem areas and hazards. In a very real sense, all other roadway users are your teammates. We all agree to play under the same "rules" - laws and regulations - and our goal is the same - to reach our destinations safely. If everyone thought this way, the number of accidents in our area would plummet. Follow Officer Kennedy's lead - take this opportunity to implement the lessons learned from sports into your everyday activities!

And kids, the next time that your parents won't let you head out back for a pick-up basketball game or a whiffleball game, just politely remind them that it is a fundamental park of your driver education!