Learning to drive can be quite the process, but when freshman Audrey Cameron encountered a dangerous experience on the highway, she realized that mastering it can be quite the bump in the road.

“It was scary,” Cameron said. She came across one of her first crazy experiences on the road, which occurred when an elderly man drove on the highway going 95 miles an hour, weaving in between lanes. 

Cameron is one of three former students of Driver’s Education who shared their experiences and the process of learning.

“It takes a long time to notice everything around you,” Cameron explains. She had been learning how to master driving, and her hardest parts were parking and learning to recognize everything that is going on around her, she added. 

When it comes to her favorite parts, though, she enjoys something that most everyone would.

“Driving on the highway going 75 [was] so fun,” she said.

  CMR sophomore Ben Bailey has a similar experience in Driver’s Education.

Bailey had driven before the class, he said. Like many kids, he started to learn to drive with his family on their property before he got into Driver’s Education. “Overall I was a pretty good driver going in,” he added.

Similar to Cameron’s experience, Bailey has also faced some trouble on the road.

 He was driving in a snowstorm in the middle of winter, and a truck stopped in the center of the road. If he hadn’t been paying attention, he would have crashed into the back of it. Because of this, Bailey is a more cautious driver, he explained.

 Out of everything, he says that getting waved by the Drivers Ed teacher was worth it all. “I started to level off, and I knew I’d be alright,” he said.

As soon as he got his license, though, he did get some responsibilities. He had to drive safe, of course, and take his sisters places after school, he said.

 Kristi Walker, a mother of three, also recalls her driver’s education experience as if it were yesterday.

She said. Mr. Dietz was good at teaching because she managed to get the hang of driving after only six months. Similar to Bailey, she started to drive before she went in. 

“I started driving when I was 10 in the woods with my dad,” she said.

When Walker got onto the road, though, her confidence in driving faded.

“I was scared as Hell,” she said, and for good reason, too. Walker was with her friends driving around when she was 16, when she took a sharp turn on a hill, and almost flipped the car. That taught her to drive safely and more carefully, she added.

Walker now says that the freedom to drive and go wherever she wants is the thing that made it all worth it, she said.