Driving Academy Helps Fund After-School Programs

Mar 10 2010 by Sara Lacey

Many school districts around the country are cutting after-school clubs, events and driver’s education classes in an attempt to deal with dwindling budgets. However, driver’s education classes are returning to some of my area high schools.

In Douglas County, Colo., Protect and Serve Driving Academy is running driver’s education classes in several high schools. The program costs $500 per student, and the academy donates 20 percent of the cost — $100 per student — to fund the school’s extracurricular activities, according to Denver’s KMGH-TV.

“Schools are suffering budget cuts. We don’t want those after-school programs and activities to be cut,” Imtiaz Stephen, vice president of Protect and Serve Driving Academy, told KMGH-TV. “That money goes to keeping student activities running because student involvement keeps kids off the streets and out of trouble.”

The academy uses current and retired police officers to teach the classes. School-based police officers, who are already posted at the high schools, will teach the driver’s ed classes.

I’m so proud of this business for stepping up and providing creative solutions to not only the problem of driver’s education classes disappearing from our schools, but also to shrinking after-school programs.  Kudos goes to Protect and Serve Driving Academy for its community involvement.