MILWAUKEE — The ability to get free in-person driver’s education classes is back at the Greater Milwaukee Urban League. Since the pandemic, the organization has been offering virtual classes. But this option means more people are getting the ability to learn the rules of the road from the experts.
Two Milwaukee teens say they have been waiting for the chance to take driver's education and never got the option while they were in school. Javon Finch, 18, says he knows he could just go to the Wisconsin Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and take the test and get his license, but he wanted to come to class.
"I would choose the other one, which is having someone to teach me,” said Finch.
“I see the other drivers, the way other people drive, and seems kind of crazy,” said Karrington Davis, 19.
The Greater Milwaukee Urban League offers driver's education classes for free to people 18 years old or older, who qualify. Last year, more than 200 people went through the program. Instructor Ed Valent says he tends to teach older people. He finds many have been driving illegally for years and don't know the rules of the road.
“I really have to drive the point home that you technically can't speed at all,” said Valent. “We make a big deal that, yes, it is legal to pass on the right if you have a legal travel lane there, but a bike lane isn't a legal travel lane for a car."
The president and CEO of Greater Milwaukee Urban League Eve Hall says this problem has been compounded since driver's education stopped being funded in Wisconsin schools decades ago.
"For our young people, if you don't have the money to go to private driver's license schools or classes, you don't have the opportunity to learn to drive. So knowing that as an organization we embarked on being a site that we could offer driver's permit classes,” said Hall.
Both Davis and Finch say without this free class they would not be able to afford driver’s ed.
“I just want to take the precautions and have all the knowledge that I can,” said Davis.
With the return of in-person classes happening again, the Urban League is on track to have 30 students a month go through the permit class. This year that means approximately 400 students should get the chance to go through the driver's education program.
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