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12 - The Oakville Beaver, Wednesday June 25, 2008 www.oakvillebeaver.com Facing the crowd REPTILES UP CLOSE: Clockwise, from top, Alex Masterman, 7, pets a tortoise during a reptile show at the Oakville Waterfront Festival on Sunday; the crowd gets to see a very large lizard; Eliana Miskey, 8, gets her face licked by that lizard; and, Madeline Kwan, 5, tries her hand at petting a giant python during the show. PHOTOS BY CHRIS KORNACKI / OAKVILLE BEAVER This title is seen all too often in the newspaper... Advertorial by DriveWise School is out at the end of June and with summer brings increased traffic to our roads and highways. Summer months also see an increase of young drivers on the roadways and tragically the summer months are always the deadliest months of the year for teenage motor vehicle fatalities which are alarmingly high in the months of June, July and August. Crash risk is particularly high during the first years that teenagers are eligible to drive. The top five driver-related factors for teenage drivers involved in fatal motor vehicle crashes include: Driving too fast, Running off the road, Driving in the wrong lane, Driving under the influence of alcohol, drugs, or medication & Erratic or reckless driving. In addition nearly half of all teen crashes involved vehicles with one or more teen passengers. So what's the solution...?? Perhaps traditional methods of driver training are no longer sufficient in preventing the losses on our roadways. Just teaching the basics to get the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) certificate is not good enough anymore. While even more disappointing, given the above facts, is that 80% of the drivers on our roadways have not taken any formal driver training at all. We need to equip our youth for ALL of the hazards facing them on the roadways today. It is for this reason that Tim & Nancy Danter, owners of All Dominion Driver Training and Traffic Education Centres Limited, who had been operating as franchisees of the Premium Branded Driver Training Company across Canada, for the past 20 years Crashes claim teens' lives in Oakville, have recently switched to offering the MTO approved DriveWise Beginner Driver Education Program. Danter says "The DriveWise program has taken defensive driving, which we have been teaching for years, to the next level." DriveWise has incorporated fully interactive virtual reality simulation training with hands-on instruction into the standard 25 hours of classroom time, as mandated by the MTO. The Simulator allows us to create and teach emergency scenarios while in the safety of the classroom. This includes everything from extreme weather conditions to animals large and small suddenly appearing in front of the vehicle, to emergencies occurring on the QEW at high speeds. Those same concepts are then reinforced when the student trains 1-on-1 in-vehicle for 10 hours with one of their highly trained driving instructors. "We're trying to reinforce the materials three times, through three different stimuli," explains Danter. "We have always shown and continue to show an amazing video inclass produced by MADD that portrays the consequences of driving with impairments. The DriveWise program takes this one step further by having the impairments experienced while driving on the simulator. Students will wear fatal vision goggles and drive a 2 minute scenario experiencing the feeling of driving while having consumed a lot of alcohol. We then can replay for them from an aerial and side view their actual simulated drive, to show them how their vehicle handling abilities had decreased tremendously. We can simulate other impairments like texting a friend, talking on a cell phone, friends chatting & laughing loudly behind them and even consuming food or beverages while driving," says Danter. "If the students are not engaged hands-on in their learning environment, then those concepts so vital for survival on our roadways, are not being transferred to them effectively." DriveWise is also the preferred training program for fire services, EMS and police trainees. This program is also available for Corporate and Fleet Training. Companies can bring in their fleets and have training programs designed on the simulator for their specific incidents occurring within their fleets. Through a combination of traditional and non-traditional methods of training we hope to engage the students getting the lessons across to them in a way that ensures proper learning retention has occurred. These interactive lessons are one solution we feel will help prevent tragic losses on our roadways today...!!! Visit the DriveWise website at www.drivewisecanada. com or locally at www.drivewiseoakville.com for more information about our program or call 905-845-7200 to find out about summer class times in Oakville. · MTO Approved DriveWise Beginner Driver Education program Snow in July? · The ONLY Defensive Driving Program Which INCLUDES Virtual Reality Simulation We guarantee you will experience it at DriveWise! · EXTENSIVE HANDS-ON TRAINING In-class with simulations & in-vehicle For Course Information:{905} 845-7200 or Email: info@drivewiseoakville.com Upcoming summer courses FILLING UP FAST! Simulator not exactly as shown.