Here in MD you pass a written test to get a learner’s permit, then you start driving.
You can apply at 15 years 9 months but then you need a sealed letter from the high school stating you haven’t missed more that so many days from school. Miss too many days and you can’t get it.
You have to take drivers ed with includes at least 6 hours of driving instruction. I think it is 30 hours of classroom.
Then you have to keep a log of at least 60 hours of driving experience with all kinds of criteria which must be met - so many daytime, dusk, dawn, nighttime hours, driving in inclement weather at different times, driving in the city, on the highway, in different traffic conditions.
There’s even a place in the log for the parent/teen contract outlining the rules and consequences for breaking the rules.
It’s a good thing… after all, without the state to guide me how in the world could I ever raise a child.
Things have changed a lot in the last 10 years in terms of teen driving. When I got my license in 1995, it was a written test at 15.5 to get a learner’s permit, and a driving test at 16 to get full driving privileges. Now there are curfews (no driving after dark unless it’s for work) until you’re 18, and there’s a period of time where you’re only allowed to drive with a licensed adult 18+ in the passenger seat. Many states adopted similar laws, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Arkansas’ graduated license plan started recently.
The important thing is to read and understand the local laws before deciding that “this is how I learned when I was a kid” and taking your kid to a parking lot where they drive through a store.
I don’t remember having to take a test before getting my learner’s permit, but this was back in 1973, when the war on ignorance was just getting underway. This was in Pennsylvania. You could get your permit at the age of 15 years and 9 months. I learned from both my parents, first in parking lots, then on the street. There were two classes of licenses. There was a junior license you possessed if you were between 16 and 18. It was restricted in the number of hours you could drive. You couldn’t drive between midnight and 6 AM unless you had a licensed driver at least 18 years old in the front seat with you. You automatically received a full license at age 18, or if you were under 18 you could get a full license if you had your parents’ permission and passed a drivers’ ed class.
Also, I wore an onion on my belt, which was the fashion of the time.
I’m in the process of teaching my son to drive here in Texas. There was only a written exam to get his learner’s permit. As of now we are working on getting the required 20 hours of behind-the-wheel experience done. He is required to wait 6 months from obtaining the permit before he is allowed to test for the license.
I’d love it if they made it illegal for parents to teach their kids to drive. Have you been on the roads lately? You think parents are qualified to teach their kids to drive? I don’t. Driving is the most dangerous thing we all do regularly, and the requirements for acquiring these skills seem ridiculously lax to me. 25,580 fatal car crashes in 2012 in the US? How is this not outraging everyone, every day? (The fatal crashes are actually going down, but I think that’s a factor of safety in the cars, not better drivers.)
Colorado.
15 - 15.5 yo
Identification
30 hours classroom instruction passed less than 6 months before applying for the permit.
Written and vision test.
Parental Affidavit of Liability Guardianship
15.5-16
Same as above but you can substitute a 4 hour driver awareness program for the 30 hour class
Getting a license
Permit for 12 months
50 hours of driving time logged by parent or driver ed teacher.
6 hour behind the wheel certificate (in addition to your 50 logged hours)
Drive test
Proof of address
Back in my day, at 16 you could get a learner’s permit by passing a written test and showing your Driver’s Ed Certificate of Completion. Come to think of it, we did drive in Driver’s Ed, but it was in a vehicle that was BOLDLY MARKED as a DE car, it had dual brakes, and the instructor was in the front passenger seat. I think you had to wait until you were 18 if you didn’t take Driver’s Ed.
At that time, they had recently made a new rule that you could NOT get your Driver’s License the same day you got your Learner’s Permit. I think you had to wait 2 weeks.
I never understood why states would issue a motorcycle license to a 15 year old. The first kids in my high school that drove were on motorcycles. A few had these Cushman three wheel mail cartsbought from surplus. They qualified as a motorcycle too. The rest of us spent that school year taking the school bus.
The law may have changed by now. Even a little Honda 70 is dangerous if not driven safely.
Nitpick: To give a learner lessons in the UK, you need to be over 21, and to have held a licence for at least 3 years.
I had my first lesson, with a professional instructor, on a dead-end basically disused road in the middle of nowhere, after a quick mess around in a car park my parents owned. Professional instruction was standard among my friends.
Wow, things sure have changed. I didn’t have Driver’s Training, never drove a car, tractor, simulator or go-kart, but when I turned 16, I told my mom, “Mom, you can walk home or ride with me, but I’m taking the wheel.” She rode.
2 weeks later, I passed my driving test. Not with flying colors, but it was good enough, and that’s all she wrote.
arkansas is one of the more rural states. it is a bit scary to find out how young kids are when they start driving tractors on farms. by 14 a farm kid could have been operating motor vehicles for 4-5 years.
also the driving test could have been drive around the courthouse and park. that was the driving test for a small nebraska town in the 1980’s. just mind boggling. no parallel parking, just between the lines slant.
When my mom learned to drive, she drove into a storefront, too! She had her learner’s permit, my dad was with her, they were in a large shopping center parking lot… Only differences? She was 42 years old, it was 1966, it was Sunday so all the stores were closed and the lot was empty. I don’t think she got a ticket, but of course they had to pay for the damage.
Dad started teaching me to drive at age 9 in the mall parking lot on Sundays. I’d drive Mom’s car an automatic and Dad’s pick-up a manual. Even before that he would teach me what to look for. And pointed out stupid things other people did. At 14 once I was big enough Dad started letting me drive his semi around the truck park at work. He had me backing a trailer up to the dock between other trucks. Never bothered with a learners permit. Got my license on my 16[sup]th[/sup] birthday. While 16 I would go on the road with him. At 18 I got my Class A and went to work for him till I went in the Army. Then I got to drive some fun stuff. It’s hard to remember a time when I couldn’t drive.
In Australia we just pass a written exam and then have to log 120 hours of driving with a fully licensed person, this is effectively anyone over about 23. You have to be 17 and 9 months to get your learners.
We have a very low fatality rate and it may come down to not being able to get your license until you are 18, which lines up nicely with our drinking age.
FYI 6.1 per 100,000 compared to USA 10.4 and we are a similar physical size to North America so it’s not long distance driving.
To me the insistence on passing a physical driving test is due to effective lobbying from the car school industry.
As far as I know, here in the Netherlands, you have to take lessons with an official instructor. You drive in his car, which has an extra set of brakes/gas/clutch on the passenger site (so he can stop you, help you with the clutch when you’re starting out). You won’t get to drive solo, until you’ve passed your test… and you can’t start lessons until you’re 18. Getting a license is kind of an expensive thing.
Yes, was amongst my friends too. Your Dad can teach you, but the test is so picky about driving style, I don’t think most parents have the knowledge to get their kids through the test.
I recently went on a speed awareness course (cough, yes, I was caught speeding). Most people in the room had been driving 20+ years, and the instructor made a big point that youngsters are taught a different driving style these days - things like when to change gears - mainly because the design of cars have changed, and us old farts drive in such a way that allows us to slip into marginal speeding (say, 34 in a 30 zone) because we change gears too quickly as we speed up .
