I Learned To Drive As An Adult
And it made me a better teacher
“She does not know how to drive,” said one of my colleagues to another. I was visiting the university campus in Lexington, Kentucky, where I would soon start work. I had just revealed to my colleagues in a conversation that I did not have a car yet. The other colleague’s eyes widened in surprise. They both exchanged a look, one that my insecurity about not knowing how to drive made me interpret as: they are judging me. My ears felt hot, my face turned red, and my palms were sweaty. This was not the first time that I had felt self-conscious about not knowing how to drive in a social situation.
I had moved to Columbus, Ohio as an international graduate student from India in 2013. Public transport was excellent in Kolkata, India (where I grew up) — most people can live their whole lives without learning how to drive. Though Columbus did not possess a stellar public transport system, I lived close enough to my campus and the grocery store to get by using the local bus system. When I needed to travel longer distances, I would rely on services like Uber and Lyft.
The first three years of graduate school were fun but challenging because of the newness of everything, leaving me no time to think about learning how to drive. But, if truth be told, my procrastination was also triggered by my stressful driving experiences in India. I struggled with manual transmission cars, which are standard there. I was terrible at managing the clutch and changing the gear (does the car ever really speak to you?!). Combined with my lack of regular access to a car to practice with and the rampant disregard for traffic rules on Indian roads — learning to drive had not been easy. Oh, and did I mention the casual sexism women drivers have to deal with? I remember sharing my driving woes with a friend who thought he was being supportive when he said to me, “It’s a good thing you know you are not a good driver, most women do not admit it.” On the road, it is even worse — if you make the slightest error as a woman driver, you can be sure someone will yell out their opinion on your ineptness as a driver. During my road test, I was asked to parallel park. The men managing the testing site gathered to watch me and snickered when I failed to do it properly.
In Columbus, when I finally managed to talk myself into looking up a driving school to enroll in, I quickly realized driving classes were expensive on a graduate student stipend. Nonetheless, I enrolled for three one-hour lessons. The lessons went well, and I felt profoundly thankful for automatic cars. After psychologically reorienting myself to drive on the right and feeling comfortable with the new rules of the road, I finally felt like I could drive if I practiced enough. Yet in between training sessions with the driving instructor, I did not have a car to practice in. Although I had made close friends in the US, asking if they would be comfortable letting me practice in their car felt awkward. Also, the driving instructor’s availability often did not match my schedule and the practice sessions were too far apart to provide a sense of continuation. I never developed the confidence in my driving skills to be able to take the road test in Columbus.
My job in Lexington gave me the economic ability to afford regular driving lessons. But the only driving school in the city had gone out of business the year I moved. In 2020, a new driving school opened. Then, the pandemic started and the school postponed enrollment indefinitely. I felt jinxed. In 2021, with the COVID-19 vaccine becoming widely available and the mask mandate in place, the driving school was back in business. I took 9 hours of lessons with a wonderful instructor. One thing I learned from my teacher — many of his adult learners were immigrants, like me.
A colleague (also an international scholar) took me to the test site to practice and shared their own experience of failing the test once in Lexington to help me avoid the same mistakes. The owner of the driving school recognized the difficulty of not having access to a car while learning to drive and offered to let me use her car to take the road test. My partner gifted me extra driving lessons before my test. Although most of the people I have met in the US expect all adults to be able to drive, I have much gratitude for the people who did not make such assumptions and were willing to go the extra mile to support me in my effort to learn how to drive.
Before I took the road test, I found a video clip of Jimmy Kimmel commenting on Cardi B not knowing how to drive even though she had just bought a Lamborghini. The rapper responded with a sassy and prompt, “No, and?” Kimmel was clearly taken aback by her self-assuredness.
I watched and re-watched this clip a hundred times to draw the courage to be comfortable in my own skin.
I passed the test in November 2021 on my first try. When the examiner praised my driving skills (my parallel parking skill, in particular) at the end of the test, I almost cried.
In the uncomfortable conversations like the one with my colleagues in Lexington, I always felt the urge to explain myself. As if my worth as a person somehow depended on my ability to drive. Until I consciously decided not to do it anymore. So, while I could feel the involuntary bodily sensations of shame in response to my colleagues’ non-verbal communication, this time I was able to reframe my thoughts: I did not owe my colleagues an explanation. This change in perspective was empowering.
Looking back on the innumerable socially awkward situations revolving around not knowing how to drive in the US has made me reflective of my own responses to the admission of ignorance or incompetence on the part of others. In my role as an educator at a public university in the US, I work with students who come not only from different parts of the US, but also the world. My courses typically involve collaborative face-to-face discussions as a way of learning, a common practice in US university teaching.
However, I was compelled to re-examine the assumptions underlying my use of class discussions after a student shared their struggle to participate in them with me. English was not the student’s first language and they experienced considerable anxiety during class discussions. Following the conversation with the student, I began incorporating alternative modes of participation to create equitable opportunities for students to engage in discussion. The student in question preferred to share their thoughts through the online discussion board prior to class. Allowing the student to participate virtually made it easier for them to organize and express their thoughts in class, removing the pressure of formulating them on the spur of the moment. I am not sure if I would have been so ready to listen, learn, and adapt, in a similar situation earlier in my teaching career.
The kindness and empathy of other people in response to my driving predicament in the US has compelled me to rethink many of my instructional practices within a multicultural classroom. I was happy that my student felt comfortable sharing their vulnerability with me and that I was personally in a place to be able to recognize how I could best support their learning.
In my work in higher education, I frequently notice a great deal of trepidation among adult students in admitting that they do not know something and need help. Now, as an educator I am actively thinking about ways in which I can normalize admissions of ignorance or inexperience or failure without a fear of judgment within learning environments. Especially for adults.
