Manitoba Public Insurance 10th annual Driver Ed. Challenge is giving high school students across the province a chance to showcase their driving skills – and win some prize money in the process.
Registrations are now being accepted for the 2012/13 Driver Ed. Challenge, an annual event designed to educate young motorists about safe driving techniques.
“Our Driver Education program has a proud history of helping prepare young Manitoba drivers for the road,” said Ward Keith, executive director, Driver Safety & Regulatory Control, Manitoba Public Insurance. “The Driver Ed. Challenge is now in its 10th year of providing practical, engaging and fun elements to help teach students the appropriate skills for driving on our roads.”
The Challenge is broken into three phases – an online quiz, a regional driving challenge and an in-car skills competition.
“The Challenge is open to high school students currently or previously enrolled in Driver Education that have a learner or intermediate licence,” said Keith. “Each year, hundreds of teenagers compete in this exciting and educational event and one young individual is crowned ‘best new Driver Ed. teen driver’ in the province.”
Registrations can be completed online at www.mpi.mb.ca. Students who complete the online quiz before December 31 are eligible to advance to their regional driving challenge, which takes place sometime between January and April. From there, the top 50 students in the province will move on to the skills competition which is held each year in late May or early June. As part of that event, students are given the opportunity to test their advanced road safety techniques by driving actual Winnipeg Police Service cars – along with a supervising officer.
The top three students at the skills competition will walk away with scholarship prizes of $2,000, $1,500 and $1,000.
About Driver Education
Manitoba Driver Education courses are taught by approximately 300 instructors at 170 high schools across Manitoba, and the program is open to all students who attend a Manitoba high school on a full-time basis.
Students receive 34 hours of in-class instruction, eight hours of behind-the-wheel training and eight hours of in-car observation. Students must be at least 15 ½ years of age to qualify for a learner’s permit under this program.
Every year over 12,000 Manitoba high school students participate in the program.
