Diary Of An ADI

Archive for September, 2009

A while back, following a consultation exercise, the DSA decided that from October 2010 instructors were going to have to sit in on candidates’ tests whether they (or the candidate) liked it or not.

Now personally, I didn’t want to have to do this, but neither did I have much of a problem with it. But I must say that the logic the DSA had used in order to bring this in was highly questionable.

The consultation it came out of (allegedly) was to do with cutting accidents among new drivers. If you didn’t see the actual consultation, you will undoubtedly have heard the confused echoes via pupils or the press – all the talk of having to wait until people were 18 before being allowed to drive, having to take lessons with a qualified instructor (ADI), having to take a minimum number of lessons, and so on.

In reality, those confused echoes originated from some semi-sensible ideas that had been thrown around. There was talk of having ADIs sign off candidates’ competence at manoeuvres, which would mean the test itself was longer and involved trickier driving skills. This would mean that pupils had to be trained to a higher level (i.e. one of the concerns about current poor road skills and subsequent accidents) by someone who knew what they were doing (an ADI), which would take longer (at least 12 months in most cases). This is partly where the misconception about raising the driving age to 18 came from.

The DSA’s consultation paper didn’t ask people what they thought could be done. It simply told people what was probably going to happen anyway. Worse still, the semi-sensible ideas like the one given above had already been dismissed – in fact, anything other than the most banal and ridiculous ideas had been long gone from the agenda. Cutting a long story short, the only thing which was likely to be implemented in most peoples lifetimes - and it is quite frightening really that such an expensive consultation could have ended up being so limited – was the one about sitting in the back on tests.

Quite where this idea came from isn’t known. Not to me, anyway. But somehow or other, the DSA had decided that road accidents among new drivers were as a direct result of ADIs not sitting in on candidates’ tests!

Because of my background, I could hazard a guess as to where this idea came from. It is so abstract and unjustifiable that it could only come from someone who doesn’t have a clue about driving, driving instruction, and driver attitudes on the roads (or how deep a problem attitude is, and how it goes way beyond just driving). So I suspect the blame must lie  initially with one of the DSA’s new graduates a few years ago, and then a chain of people highly trained in Teamworking®, commissioned to praise that new graduate. No doubt, that original new graduate is well on his or her way up the “corporate” (this is a Government department) ladder.

But I digress: to anyone with an ounce of sense, it is obvious that accidents are not down to ADIs not sitting in on tests.

That’s the background. The good news is, though, that from what I have heard this week the idea has now been scrapped – ADIs will NOT have to sit in on tests any more. Candidates will be asked specifically if they want their ADI there, but that’s all.

EDIT 29/09/2009: Reading the various forums you’d be forgiven for thinking that the DSA backed down on this after a major battle involving broadswords and light sabres, during which they were roundly defeated by the Mighty [INSERT NAME OF THE LEADER OF WHICHEVER ORGANISATION OR UNION IS CLAIMING CREDIT], and forced to renounce The Dark Side for ever more. Phrases such as “DSA caves in” and “DSA backs down” are rife.

The reality appears to be as follows:

[those present heard] the DSA explain that they were proposing to trial allowing the pupil the choice to allow their ADI to sit in and observe their test.

Not quite what is being reported by some, and it does leave the way open for the idea to be resurrected in future.

A colleague of mine sent me an email from his franchiser which explains:

There are benefits to all concerned from the introduction of the observer on test, in particular because it introduces a basis for regular dialogue between the driving instructors and the examiners at their local driving test centre. We all recognise that communication could be improved between these parties, and so if as a result there is greater openness, understanding and cooperation between instructors and examiners for the good of the candidates taking the driving test, that will benefit road safety and all concerned.

 

It is a pragmatic compromise on the part of the DSA giving them the opportunity to trial the observer on test more widely before they consider introducing it through regulation at a later stage.

Following in from the first post in this series, I was out with a pupil last night. Everything was fine – she was driving well, keeping to lanes… it was… well, fine.

We came to a roundabout, where ‘straight ahead’ is the first exit, and if it wasn’t for the presence of the roundabout the road would actually be almost straight, with a slight curl to the left. I pointed up the road we wanted and said:

We’re going straight ahead at the roundabout, first exit… it’s up there [I'm pointing here, remember].

So, she gets on to the roundabout – it’s not a large one – in the left lane (of three). At the exact point where we just want to follow the road ahead, she just about rips the wheel off the steering column and tries to take us across two lanes of traffic to take the right-hand 2nd exit.

It reminded me of a pupil I had last year (which I may have mentioned previously). We were on a lesson in the dark during one of the cold spells. It was -2°C outside, and the gritters were out in force. As we approached a simple two-exit roundabout (the first exit was at 90 degrees and was a left turn, the second exit was literally straight ahead), I told him we were going straight ahead.

The problem was, he didn’t even begin to think about where ‘straight ahead’ was until he’d got on to the roundabout. In the split second he had to work it out, his brain told him that ‘straight ahead’ was wherever the car was pointing. Unfortunately, this translated into trying to remove the steering wheel from the steering column to take the first exit, because that was just about visible out of the windscreen now we were at an angle on the roundabout!

When they do things like this it is a great opportunity to explain the importance of planning ahead. It also emphasises the importance of you planning ahead and bringing a spare set of underwear!

No matter how many times they do something totally unexpected, you can be sure they’ll find something else even more unexpected to scare you to death with in future.

Well done KC for passing first time with just 4 driver faults on the toughest test route they have at that test centre - and after only 23½ hours of tuition, too!

Compared to my last pupil on test, you were a model student and a pleasure to teach.

It was also good to see you driving on your own within 4 hours. Be safe!

I was on a lesson tonight, and the pupil had got the mirrors set and we had just driven off from his house. Bearing in mind he has his test in a couple of weeks, after about a hundred metres he said:

Is the mirror set on dim?

I glanced over and could just see the top of his head and most of the ceiling in it. I reached over, twitched the mirror downwards, and replied:

No. Only you.

Earlier in the week, I was driving along with another pupil. We’d just gone past National Speed Limit signs, and he said:

What’s the speed limit here?

I answered (surprised, as I know he knows what these signs mean, and he’d accelerated anyway):

It’s 60 – didn’t you see those NSL signs?

He replied:

Yes, but why does it say 50 on those signs?

I explained:

There is a railway track up on that embankment, and they are there for the trains.

Then again, today, I had one pupil who “lost it” (his own words) at a roundabout and tried to aim straight across it to take the exit we wanted, and then – after I grabbed the wheel – repeatedly tried to drive in any direction except on the road by engaging full lock one side, then the other. When I tried to get to the bottom of it (and I tried very hard), the only thing the pupil could say about why he did it was:

I honestly don’t know.

I hate that outcome.

And also today (the same pupil who hadn’t adjusted his mirror properly), I said:

At the roundabout, turn right, 3rd exit.

It’s a small roundabout, so we approach a little too fast, swing round quickly past exits 1 and 2, then past 3, and finally exit 4, at which point I grabbed the wheel to prevent us going back the way we came (but slicing across two lanes, as it is a dual carriageway).

And this is the bit that always gets me:

Weren’t you counting the exits so you could take the correct one?

Yes!

So why didn’t you take exit 3?

No answer.

Well done, GS, for passing with 6 driver faults. There will never be another one like you!

I offer my thanks to The Almighty for this pass, as it now means I won’t have to argue with you anymore about such things as when I used to have to grab the wheel because you were going too wide, it didn’t matter that you “were going to steer back” just as I grabbed it. The fact that I had to grab it at all was the issue.

Ah, yes. And when you used to approach junctions too fast and I used the dual controls, the fact that you “were going to stop” was of much lower priority than my significant concern that you had left it too late and might not. And the examiner would have seen it that way, too.

And at roundabouts, when you would insist on taking your eyes off the oncoming traffic just as a gap was appearing to stare left, and so missed the opportunity and ended up holding traffic up. Every time without fail, and then argued with me about it.

And at junctions, when you would stare blankly to the right (when turning left) – with absolutely nothing visible for miles – and then drive out without steering or looking left at all, and then argue with me about grabbing the wheel or using the brake to avoid traffic coming from that side.

And all those times when you were unable to complete a manoeuvre properly, yet when I tried to analyse why it had gone wrong you would say “I know I did it wrong so there’s no point in going on about it”. If you’d have listened you could have passed with fewer lessons, instead of having to hit on the correct procedure by trial and error.

But that’s all in the past now. Phew!

I’ve noticed a new and worrying trend amongst certain drivers as I’m travelling around each day, involving sat nav devices.

The manual for TomTom sat navs is quite clear on how and where to mount the unit, and why.

TomTom Manual - Mounting The Unit Safely

I am seeing more and more people with these things mounted right in the middle of the windscreen – presumably so they don’t have to move their heads to look at it. Only last night I was behind a woman in a black Mini Cooper and the sat nav was mounted right in the vertical centre of the windscreen and considerably to the right side of the rearview mirror.

The problem is that it always seems to be a certain kind of person – a development, if you like, of the chavs and boyracers. I guess the boys like to think they’re riding around the universe in Fireball XL-5 or something. Not sure what the girls do it for (I won’t say anything about navigational ability here).

Joking aside, it’s only a matter of time before someone has an accident and it is lack of visibility that has contributed. The girl I saw last night – and she is one of several this week – flew through a 20mph zone at well above the limit, and zoomed around a corner at traffic lights in typical try-to-rip-the-steering-wheel-off-and-do-it-on-two-wheels chav-like style.