BRAKES (Be Responsible and Keep Everyone Safe) is a nonprofit organization that aims to save lives and prevent accident-related injuries among teens by giving them the right education and training about safety driving for free.
It's an organization created by Doug Herbert. He understands speed having competed as a race driver. However, it wasn't until he lost his two sons to speed driving that he felt the need to create a difference to the lives of other teens.
Around 6 years ago, his two sons, aged 17 and 12, went to McDonald's with the older as the designated driver. They weren't able to make it back home; his son was driving very fast and lost control of the vehicle.
The program is composed of 5 different exercises with the student teen sitting behind the wheel each time. These include accident avoidance, drop-wheel recovery, distraction, panic stop, and car control and recovery. The entire session is good for 4 hours.
Each of these exercises has a specific goal. For instance, the first one, accident avoidance, is composed of two parts: one, a simulation of a potential accident involving an animal or a person that requires a split-second reaction from the driver, and two, an exercise using cones that he or she needs to learn to navigate.
The drop-wheel exercise, meanwhile, teaches the students how to recover from a drop wheel and immediately regain control of the vehicle. This exercise is very essential for North Carolina teens since accidents involving drop wheel are very common in the state.
Although the program is more focused on the teens, it's also open to parents. It also occurs twice a year in North Carolina. BRAKES has also traveled in other parts of the country such as California, Georgia, and South Carolina. So far, more than 10,000 parents and teens have already joined.
