When you were a teenager , would you have wanted your parent to administer the official psychometric test for you to get yourdriver ’s licence ? Now let ’s flip out that scenario around to all of you parent . If you had the choice of instruct your nestling to driveandthe responsibility of administering their official driving mental testing , would you do it ? If you answered yes , you might want to look at go to Texas .
That ’s because the commonwealth legislature there has advise a bill , HB 409 , that would give Texas teens and their parent the option of skip the driver ’s license examination quickness totally and or else completing the driving test at home .
How the Law Works Now
The driver ’s male erecticle dysfunction subprogram presently requires 32 hour of classroom time and 44 hours of hand - on driving experience , and those requirement would persist under this visor . Until 2009 , parents were allowed to administer the test , but the bill was repealed by lawmakers who cerebrate that policy was too dangerous .
In 2014 , lawmakers made an endeavour to change the law to allow driving schoolhouse to give the last drive test , but that approach had a few problems . First , not every family has admittance to a individual driving schooltime , specially families living in rural areas . And private drive school day are expensive . Second , not every schoolhouse is certify to dole out the final run .
HB 409 want to change that . It allege in part :
In other words , the Texas DPS would continue administer drive trial , but if the beak passes ( it involve a yes voter turnout from two - thirds of the member elected to each house ) , the idea is that it would take with far fewer of them . If the bill is successful , it will take effect Sept. 1 , 2019 .
Teens and Crashes
We utter to Rep. White , about why he felt the need to pen the peak . In Texas , like many states , they have a fine-tune driver ’s license computer programme , he explain . It ensures teens have plenty of time behind the wheel under a variety of driving status . He also point out that prior to 2009 , the DoS ’s licensing procedure for teens was the same as what he ’s proposing in HB 409 . He ’s simply hear to make the Texas DPS more effective by enabling parents to opt out of the current arrangement . " This is not something new in Texas , " White say .
clean provided data from the Texas Department of Health shew crash statistics for teen drivers for the fiscal years 2011 through 2016 . The chart demonstrate the total number of scholar driver for each yr , broken down by scholarly person who attend commercial or individual driving school , those who take through their public schooling course , and those who were taught by their parent . Let ’s look at the most recent statistic , for 2016 :
In other words , fewer parent - learn initiate drivers were ask in hit than those who trained in a public or private driver ’s education course . datum going back from 2014 to 2011 shows the same trend , though in 2015 , students from public schooling have a slightly lower collision rate .
" Based on the impact it ’s had on the lines [ at DPS ] , and looking at the data , there ’s literally no difference as far as safety , " White articulate . " So even if you wait at these clash involving teenager drivers , there ’s really no datum enounce who was the cause of the crash . So just because a crash happen with a teenager driver , does n’t needfully mean that the teen equipment driver is the case of the crash . "
What Do Parents Think?
Still , concerns remain . One opponent of the note is Debbie Callahan of theTexas Professional Driver Education Association . Callahantold ABC KTRKin Houston that " parents are not trained to be instructors , they ’re not trained to get it on the road rule , route signs and right bad behavior . "
One Texas parent we spoke to agrees the bill is a defective idea . Ryan St. Don , from Granbury , late avail his 16 - year - old Logos Trevor earn his driver ’s licence . Trevor ’s school day does n’t offer driver ’s education , so the St. Dons ' options were to pay for a private course or roleplay as Trevor ’s instructor . Trevor got his permit at 15 , and then St. Don teach Trevor the ruler of the road and lumber his progress as required by land procedure . After Ryan met the United States Department of State ’s requirement for driver ’s erectile dysfunction , the St. Dons took Trevor to a state examination installation .
" We got his permit so he had a full year to drive with us , so we were convinced sending him out , " St. Don says . " We had to keep logarithm of how much he was driving at nighttime , how many highway hours , city driving , stuff like that . I helped him , we congeal up cones in parking lots for three - stop good turn , parallel parking , all that material . "
Would St. Don have given Trevor his driving test if he had the alternative ?
" Absolutely not , " he says . " I think a kid knowing they have to take a trial with someone else proceed them accountable , makes them want to keep exercise , and logging all their hour . I wanted an outsider . "
For now , Texas ' approach to teen gadget driver licensing looks like singular , and it ’s voiceless to see more states take this approach . If the bill does not pass , the state budget might need to incorporate monetary fund for more test centers . If the flyer does pass , it ’ll be interesting to see if other state conform to Texas ' lede , and if the prophylactic data remains consistent .
