Serving Escambia, Santa Rosa and Okaloosa Counties.
Licensed by the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles
School License #3996
This is free Internet site-web. It is not fancy, but it has all of the relevant information. I am the webmaster. I am not
very talented at it and know very little about doing web pages, but because it is free and I do not pay a web-master,
there is no expense that has to be passed on to my Clients. Anything I can do to keep expenses and charges down, I like.
There is a lot of information on this web site. It can be overwhelming. Permit me to give
you a birds-eye view of my business.
In most cases, I find out what your highest driving goal is and after the first driving
session, I tell you how many more lessons, if any, will be needed to reach your goal. If
you have not reached your goal in the number of driving sessions I estimated, I provide
one additional 75-minute driving session tuition free.
Behind the wheel charges range from $48 per hour to $108 per hour. The more
lessons scheduled and paid for in advance and the more free lessons a driver qualifies for
and takes advantage of, the less it costs per lesson. All driving sessions are 75-minutes
unless otherwise arranged.
I provide door to door pick up service for slightly less than one-half of what it would
cost for a taxi to provide round trip service to my office.
All prepaid and unused fees are 100% refundable upon request. All training materials
are free (download). Every student receives between $230 and $900 in free additional
benefits. Like most things for FREE there are restrictions. See www.JodaCollins.com,
FREE page for complete details.
My business is "client-based". That means I will do everything within my power to make
sure you are happy. If you are ever "less than happy" let me know so I can meet your
highest expectations.
Administrative Office: Downtown Pensacola
Lessons: All driving sessions begin/end at 4033 Buttonbush Dr., Milton, FL 32583
unless otherwise arranged. We are located six miles east of Pensacola,
4/10th of one mile off Interstate 10, the second exit (Exit 126) after the
Escambia Bay Bridge.
For Driving Directions, Click: http://www.mapquest.com/?version=1.0&hk=7-fs13
or go to http://www.mapquest.com/?version=1.0&hk=7-fs13
from Milton: Click or go to http://mapq.st/ls1bIz
from Navarre: Click or go to http://mapq.st/lhxY0v
from Gulf Breeze: Click or go to http://mapq.st/iRl10I
Phone: 850 981-3355
Email: JodaCollins@aol.com
Scroll down to bottom of first column on left for additional contact method.
My Specialty and My Commitment to You!
Hello. My name is Joda Collins.
Welcome! Thank you for taking a look at my web-site. If you have any
questions, please feel free to contact me (850 981-3355, JodaCollins@aol.com).
My Commitment to You: Excellent service, excellent training and excellent
training materials provided with a Client-centered approach. I want you to
be happy with me and my business. If you are not happy, tell me and I will
do everything within reason to make you happy. I promise.
My Specialty: My specialty is defensive driving. I have driven over 1.8
million miles professionally (18-wheeler, bob-tail truck, as a chauffeur and a
driving Instructor) and developed safe-defensive driving skills at the highest
level. As a driving Instructor of more than 650 students, I have gained the
ability to work with every kind of student at every level of driving skill.
My Business Structure: I have a small business with three volunteers
each assisting me about one hour per week. This means you are,
usually, receiving the attention of the business owner.
My Business Goal: I have only one goal. That goal is to be the best
defensive driving school in the world. What does it take to be the best
driving school in the world?
1. An experienced, dedicate instructor that will train you and yours with
the mind-set that the driver's life depends on the quality of service he/she
receives and a devotion to invest in each student as if the student was his
own child, sibling or parent.
2. A commitment to do everything exceptionally well.
3. A Client-centered business that makes the needs and desires of every
Client the priority.
Without reservation of thought, I tell you that I offer you the "best"
defensive driver's training that you can find anywhere in the world. That is
a bold statement, I know. However, I believe it to be an accurate statement.
Some driving school has to be the best. This is it! In reality, since few
business have highly experienced staff who are dedicated, first and foremost,
to your success and to pleasing you as a priority, the field of top-quality
businesses, in any field, is not large.
Joda Collins
Owner/Operator
2. What I (Joda Collins) Can Do
3. What I (Joda Collins) Cannot Do
4. Is Graduation Guaranteed?
5. Are Careful Drivers Safe?
6. Definition of “A Behind the Wheel Driving Lesson"
7. Brief Break
8. Is a Learner’s Permit Required?
9. Do We Provide a Vehicle for Training?
10. Do We Provide a Vehicle for taking the State exam?
11. What Courses are offered, how much does it cost and how long does it take?
12. Service Radius
13.Can we train in Alabama?
14. Can Parents / Spouse Ride Along?
15. Hours of Operation
16. Will my insurance be less if I graduate your defensive driving course?
17. What happens if I cannot "get along" with a person?
18. State Exam Info
19. The Financial Value of Self-study.
21. How long does it take and how much does it cost?
22. Why is there a charge for door-to-door service?
1. WHAT IS DEFENSIVE DRIVING?
Defensive driving is gracefully pre-acting to possible driving dangers using 35 specific driving techniques rather than frantically reacting, in an untrained and unsafe manner, to developed dangers at the last split second.
Defensive driving is the opposite of "aggressive driving". Aggressive drivers do not show consideration for others on the road, do not "yield their rights or their time" in order to avoid crashing or make allowances for the poor driving habits of others. Defensive drivers do!
The difference between an accident and a crash is that a crash is avoidable. An accident is not avoidable. There are very few driving accidents. Almost all damage to property and life and all loss of life on the roadways are easily avoidable if any one of the drivers involved used one defensive driving technique.
It is wise to be that defensive driver, rather than hope that all other drivers on the road you share are skilled? (Few are!)
Defensive driving is the opposite of "automatic" driving. The automatic driver travels with his vehicle in "drive" but his mind in "neutral". A defensive driver drives with his/her mind operating.
Defensive driving is the opposite of "tunnel driving" (looking only straight ahead). Defensive drivers know the conditions of their driving environment at all times and in every direction.
Like all learning, it is only after one acquires the skills that one can really appreciate those skills. The only individuals that feel acquiring defensive driving skills are unimportant are those that do not know the defensive driving skills. I have never met an individual that has graduated a defensive driving course who states that learning defensive driving skills was a waste of time or money. Neither have you!!! Only those who are ignorant about defensive driving skills belittle defensive driving education/training.
2. WHAT I (Joda Collins) CAN DO
I teach:
A. New drivers to pass their Florida State Licensing Test.
B. Twelve safe driving skills that keep the driver from causing crashes.
C. Twenty-three defensive driving techniques that help people drive crash-free even when driving among poor drivers and in bad weather.
D. How to drive citation-free for life.
I teach:
E. Experienced and new drivers to be safer by teaching defensive driving skills.
F. People from other countries; those whose first language is not English.
G. Drivers with handicaps.
H. Those ordered by the Court system to satisfy court-ordered remedial behind the wheel driver’s training.
I. I provide validation of graduation for insurance companies that offer discounts for drivers that successfully complete a behind-the-wheel defensive driving course.
J. I provide evaluations" to determine if a driver is "safe behind the wheel".
Scroll down with side bar or click on center column and scroll down with down arrow for Contact Information.
10. DO I PROVIDE A VEHICLE FOR TAKING THE STATE EXAM?
Yes, when a driver takes at least one lesson from me and is a good enough driver to pass the Defensive Driving Course with a D minus, I do rent my vehicle out for others personal use for the State exam. I will provide whatever service is requested including picking up the driver, driving the driver to the test location, waiting for the driver to complete the State exam and driving the individual back to his home. The charge for this service is $1.80 per minute from the time I leave my office to the time I return to my office using standard drive times as shown on www.mapquest.com. An approximate payment (estimated amount) must be made via cash, cashier's check, money order or Visa/MasterCard before the testing session. Caution: I have never met a new or inexperience driver that has not passed a defensive driving course who could, after one lesson, pass my (or any other) defensive driving course. The Defensive Driving Course teaches 35 driving skills that equip a person to drive safely in all driving environments. Drivers that want to take one lesson in order to use my vehicle for testing are invited to try; however, do not count on using my car for your personal needs unless I am convinced you will not wreck it. That is, you must drive at least at the level of a driver that would graduate my Defensive Driving Course with a D minus.
11. WHAT COURSES ARE OFFERED, HOW MUCH DOES IT COST AND HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE?COURSES? For these details about Courses, go to the "Behind-the-Wheel Courses" page of this web site.
12. SERVICE RADIUS
Within the State of Florida, I serve a 60-mile radius from Pensacola as long as within the State of Florida.
13. DO WE SERVE ALABAMA?
Alabama drivers must cross into Florida for my behind the wheel training.
14. CAN PARENTS (SPOUSES) RIDE DURING TRAINING?
I prefer that parents and spouses ride during training. Also, I prefer that the individual paying for the lesson(s) to ride along, at least, long enough to learn the driving progress of the student. It makes it easier to pay for the training if one is able to chart the progress of the student. Most parents find the "ride along" a little frightening but quite educational. No one under the age of 12 can be in our vehicle during driver's training. Do not ride in a training vehicle if you do not feel you can ride on roller-coaster! It can be a rough ride.
15. HOURS OF OPERATION
The first lesson of the day can begin as early as 8am and the last driving session of the day can begin as late as 8pm, Monday through Saturday.
16. WILL INSURANCE BE LESS FOR GRADUATE STUDENTS OF THE DEFENSIVE DRIVING COURSE?
Probably. Call your insurance company and find out.
17. WHAT HAPPENS IF WE CANNOT "GET ALONG".
I have trained more than 650 drivers. I have not "gotten along" with five. If a driver wants to learn, can receive kind and graceful instruction and has basic manners, we will get along.
18. STATE EXAMINATION INFORMATION
Click on or go to:
http://www.lowestpricetrafficschool.com/handbooks/driver/en/2/8
to read of the requirements.
19. THE FINANCIAL VALUE OF SELF-STUDY
I have invested about 1,200 hours in separating what can be learned about safe-defensive driving from a book from what can only be learned about safe-defensive driving behind-the-wheel. I have workbooks that contain everything that can be learned about safe driving from a book. Student-drivers that avail themselves to these printed resources spend, on average, 35% to 50% less time behind the wheel and learn the same degree of safe-defensive driving as Student-drivers do not read the printed material. For more information go to www.LuLu.com/Spotlight/JodaCollins and download (free) any book that is about driving There are five. All five may not appear on the first page of that web site.
20. DRIVING AT NIGHT
Some things about night time driving cannot be taught in the daylight. Everything about daylight driving can be taught after sundown. Drivers with a permit for more than 90-days can take lessons after sundown and will always be better prepared for all driving conditions than drivers that only train in the sunlight. I do not "promote" night driving beyond making this statement. If you desire a night driving session, let me know.
21. How long does it take and how much does it cost?
The Training and Courses offered, along with the time designation and charges are on the "Behind-the-Wheel Courses" page of this web site.
22. WHY IS THERE A CHARGE FOR DOOR TO DOOR SERVICE?
Driving my car, paying myself a living wage and covering my business expenses are all accomplished by the per minute use of my time and the per mile charge for using my vehicle. I have no other source of income. If I invest my time in you and drive my car for you, I incur expenses. I charge for door-to-door pick up service about one half of what it would cost a person to take a taxi but without the hour wait; I am on time, to the minute. No one has thought longer or harder than me about how to deal with the time and mileage investment relative to door to door pick up service.
Some schools say they do not charge for door to door pick up; however, the reality is that all expenses of any business are paid by those that use the business. Schools that "do not charge" for door to door service have increased charges to everyone to cover the expense of providing the door to door service. If I offered "free" door to door service, everyone would take advantage of that service. My standard 75-minute driving lesson would take, on average, twice as long. I would be spending 50% of my work time on the road for free. My car would wear out, at least twice as fast, maintenance expense for the vehicle would double. I would have to increase my prices to cover the expense as no one in business works 50% of the time for free while doubling major expenses.
Most of my business comes from Pensacola so it would be to my advantage to move to Pensacola rather than lose the business of people who will not or can not drive to Milton for a lesson or will not or cannot pay the door to door pick up fee. Moving to Pensacola will take a major financial investment and I will need to sell my home in Milton. At the present time, I cannot afford that move. So, until then I will just have to ask those that use my service to start and end lessons in Milton or to pay for door to door service. I have no other options. In most cases, if a driver wants to learn to driver safely, the trip to my office in Milton should be looked at as an investment in a driver's safety; an investment that may save their life. Looking at it that way a 20 mile trip is a small price to pay.
To contact me, call 850 981-3355, email JodaCollins@aol.com or go to the bottom of the column to the left to email from this page.
The web site below this paragraph brings together relevant information on a variety of topical subjects including tips on teenage driving and refresher courses for the mature driver.
http://www.trafficschools123.com
I cannot lie to a student about his or her progress.
I cannot reduce my charges because my charges are based on my costs, and my costs are not going down, I use some of the most expensive comodities in this business and no one gives me a discount on anything I use that I can pass on to others. I pay more than $1,300 per month for vehicle insurance, payments, upkeep and fuel. As a self-employed individual I pay 15.6% in Social Security. I am in the 10% income tax bracket. I pay fees and taxes to local agencies, State agencies and Federal agencies. I pay for State mandated training that I have to take out of the area and pay all travel and motel expense for that training in addition to the cost of the training. The Federal Government is now taxing small business owners an additional "profit tax"on the amount of profit made. I cannot charge less or give away more and stay in business.
I cannot force a student to learn. If a student is not willing or ready to learn, it is best to delay training until he or she is willing and ready to learn to drive safely.
I cannot award a graduation from my Defensive Driving program to drivers that do not earn the graduation. Some feel that driving for 6.25 hours behind the wheel of my vehicle and paying for the training should qualify them for graduation. Not so. The State of Florida requires that students show a reasonable degree of safe driving as well as a reasonable degree of incorporating the 12 safe driving skills and the 23 defensive driving techniques into their driving habit before a graduation from the Defensive Driving Course is earned. If too many of my graduates crash, I can lose my license to teach behind the wheel training. While I cannot graduate a student just because of "time behind the wheel", like any other school, by law, I graduate students that earn as little as a D minus grade. In most cases, and always if a person asks, I will provide the "letter grade" (A, B, C, D or F) to every student. Those that want to graduate with a higher grade are encouraged to do so.
4. IS GRADUATION GUARANTEED?
No school that graduates based on performance can guarantee graduation because no one can guarantee the performance of another person. However, I do offer "guarantees" that can be read on the "Behind-the-Wheel Courses" page.
5. ARE CAREFUL DRIVERS SAFE?
People often tell me that they "do not need" behind the wheel training because they are going to be "very careful when driving". Let me illustrate the lack of wisdom in that statement: A sky-diver does not know how to pack his parachute well. Still, he sky dives. Time after time he jumps from the plane with his parachute poorly packed. However, time after time the parachute opens successfully and he lands unharmed.
When questioned about his lack of skill to pack a parachute well, he responds, "I don't need to pack my parachute well because when I sky-dive I am very careful".
Being consistently careful while jumping out of a air-borne plane cannot, consistently, overcome the dangers of a poorly packed parachute. It is only a matter of time before that sky diver crashes into the ground in a pile of lifeless, broken bones.
It is only a matter of time before a poorly trained driver crashes. Being consistently careful will not consistently overcome continuous deadly driving habits. It is only a matter of time before a needless crash occurs. The only questions to answer is, how serious will be crash be? Will one or more be injured? Will one of more be killed? How much will my insurance incrase per month and for how many years will that insurance increase be effective? Will I be able to afford that increase in payments? Do I have the money to cover my insurance deductable? After the first crash, if my child or spouse survives, will I be more serious about enrolling him or her in defensive driving and if so, how much more will it cost then than it does now? How hard will it be, how long will it take and how much will it cost me to brake long standing an established bad driving habits? The cost for learning safe-defensive driving habits increases the longer a driver drives because it takes longer to break bad driving habits and establish good driving habits than it does to establish good driving habits at the beginning.
The cost of ONE crash will far outweigh the cost of learning to drive crash free. Failing to train is the same thing as training to fail. In most cases, the cost of the insurance deductable plus the cost of increased insurance preimums will pay many times the cost of learning to drive crash free.
Every graduate of a Defensive Driving Course can give you testimonies of how the knowledge and experience gained in that training kept him or her from danger or disaster on the road. Most can give testimonies of avoiding, at least, one automobile crash by applying defensive driving techniques.
They will tell you, "One avoided crash is worth the time and financial investment required to learn and apply defensive driving skills." The average total cost of a vehicle crash with no bodily injury is $8,040.00 (2007 stats). The average total cost of a vehicle crash with bodily injury is 1.2 million dollars! It costs much less to learn to avoid vehicle crashes for a lifetime.
Some drivers are comforted by the fact that Insurance covers most of the cost. While there is some comfort in that fact, your part of the expense is sufficient. $500 deductible, $125 per month increased insurance premium for years to come, loss of work time, personal injury or the conscience of injuring or killing someone else. These are sure or probable costs. Plus, after the crash, unless the driver learned from the experience, he is likely to crash again. Even if he did learn something from the crash, he only learned how to avoid that one crash. Untrained drivers crash again and again. The avearge untrained driver crashes three times before age 25 and three times after age 25.
It takes only one skilled defensive driver to avoid most crashes. Don't depend on the driving skills of others. Why not be the skilled driver that avoids crashes because of your driving ability rather than crash because you meet another unskilled driver. Most people learn one defensive driving skill for each crash they have. There are 12 Offensive driving skills and 23 defensive driving techniques. It is much less expensive to learn them in defensive driving training than one at a time by crash-experience.
A behind the wheel driving lesson lasts 75 minutes (one hour and 15 minutes). During most or all of that time, the student is behind the wheel. When safety mandates or when it is faster to show than tell, the Instructor may have the student learn by watching first. In addition, every student is offered a free 75-minute "Show and Tell" in-car teaching session where I (Joda Collins) do all of the driving and place the vehicle in driving situations that I would not place a student-driver in and then show the driver how to avoid being in those driving conditions and, if unavoidable, how to handle safely those driving conditions. This "Show and Tell" session increases the time the student-driver is behind the wheel for the paid sessions to almost 100%.
Yes, unless otherwise stated or otherwise arranged we provide the vehicle for training. Our vehicle has cloth interior that stains easily and absorbs odors. We are grateful to students that schedule their driving session so they can shower after work or school and enter our vehicle in clean clothing. Please do not bring any drinks, except water in a bottle with a cap, into the vehicle. Please do not bring any foods or candies into the vehicle. Please do not chew gum, nuts, sun flower seeds, etc in my vehicle. I, like most of us, have a few quirks. Gum smacking and gum popping makes me nervous. I get away from gum smackers and poppers with all speed. In my vehicle if a gum smacker or popper is beside or behind me, I cannot get away. And, it is not wise for me to allow myself to become nervous or distracted for the sake of everyone in the vehicle. I understand the medical profession now has a diagnosis for those of us that have this difficulty. You can look it up on the internet if it interests you (www.SoftSoundSelectiveSyndrome). So, thank you for spitting out your gum. Sometimes people promise me they will not pop or smack gum, candies, nuts, etc. and expect me to okay the items. For 75-minutes, please do without that stuff. If you can't, I will stop for a few minutes during the training so you can get your "fix" and not charge you for that time.
