Traffic laws are boring, but then that’s entirely by design. After all, if they were complex enough to be interesting, they would be complex enough for people to get wrong on a regular basis, and there are already millions of recorded traffic accidents every year in America (and probably millions more fender benders that never get a police report). So it’s good that the signs are obvious and the rules are straightforward, but it does guarantee that any defensive driving course or other lesson based around driving laws is going to be incredibly boring.
Still, even if driving lessons and traffic schools are boring, that doesn’t mean that each one is exactly as boring as the rest. There is a better alternative to in-person lessons with an instructor who may be even more bored than you are and an old DVD filled with even older videos that weren’t very engaging even when they were new. The internet has opened a whole new world of possibilities, and even something as mundane as a defensive driving course can benefit from using it.
The Online Advantage
For many topics, in-person lessons are the best way to learn. A teacher or professor can answer questions posed by students, modify the lesson plan based on how the class is doing, and come up with new topics and new ideas to make the whole process more fun. However, very little of that has to do with the state-regulated material of a defensive driving course. The material was designed to avoid being challenging in the first place, and it’s always the same every time, so there’s no need for the personal touch of an instructor (at least before the practical lessons begin).
On the other hand, the internet is a medium like no other. Where else can you combine text, images, video, and audio with instant feedback delivered from what may be the other side of the world? An online traffic school or driver’s education course can make use of all these methods to improve information retention, and a simple chat window can effectively answer what few questions the course takers may have. Automated online lessons might not be the best solution in every case, but they definitely have the advantage in this case.
The Quality Control Problem
While an online defensive driving course can have plenty of advantages, it’s worth pointing out that there’s no real guarantee that a course will make full use of them. After all, while creating an online course gives you a lot of tools to work with, you don’t have to use them. An online traffic school could be nothing more than a hypertext-formatted book on driving with just enough features to pass a state certification.
Then there’s the fact that you can access every online course certified by your state all at once. Having plenty of choices is usually a good thing, but if you can’t tell which ones are good or bad before you pay for it, it can become a problem.
The Traffic School Critics Solution
The best way to tell if something is good or not before you buy it is to read a review about it, but the problem is that there aren’t many people out there willing to sit through the boring, repetitive material of a defensive driving course. However, fortunately for you, you’ve come across Traffic School Critics, a site that reviews online traffic schools and driver’s ed courses so that you can find out what they have to offer.
Along with the lessons themselves, TSC looks at other important factors like how long the site has been around, how many successful graduates have gone through the course, and what other people are saying about it on online review sites like Yelp and Google. We also like to see 24/7 customer service, since a person could be taking the course at any time of day and need help. We then give the course a rating of 1-5 stars, and if it passes our strictest requirements, it also receives our TSC certificate.
A defensive driving course is never going to be an exciting way to spend your time, but there’s still a big difference between good and poor quality. Fortunately, Traffic School Critics is here to let you know which of your options is worth your time.
Course Quality and Value
One of the most important things to look into in any online education provider is the quality of the course they offer and its value relative to the price you are paying for it.
We want to make sure that the school’s course content is up-to-date with the current driving rules in the State where it is provided. We check if it has been localized to state-specific laws and guidelines.
We also look into the aspect of technology, seeing that the digital transformation has been continuously changing the virtual learning platform. We want to make sure that the school can adapt to these changes. And if they are a little bit behind, we want to make sure that our readers know that as well.
Then we look at the overall learning experience for the students. We usually check students’ reviews for a more honest opinion on the school’s course materials and the way the lessons are delivered. We know that each student has a different learning style, so relying on their reviews will give us more insight into the school’s teaching style and how it was received by not just a single type of student, but ALL students.
Some schools will offer their courses cheaper than normal ones as part of their marketing strategy. So we can’t always say that the cheaper courses are more recommended. What we do is review the course that they are offering, look for the special features that come along with it, and check if the price you are paying corresponds to the overall product that you are paying for.
A defensive driving course is never going to be an exciting way to spend your time, but there’s still a big difference between good and poor quality. Fortunately, Traffic School Critics is here to let you know which of your options is worth your time.