Toyota Australia hosted more than 70 year-ten students from the Australian International Academy at a Road Safety Education (RSE) RYDA workshop at the company’s Centre of Excellence in Altona, Melbourne.
The Victorian Minister for Roads and Road Safety, Melissa Horne, attended the event to observe the RYDA workshop’s impact on students.
She spoke with teachers from the Australian International Academy about the effectiveness of the workshop, not just in terms of the topics covered but the interactive delivery that keeps students moving throughout the day and ensures participatory learning.
“Keeping our most vulnerable road users safe is a priority for the Victorian Government as we strive to achieve zero road deaths by 2050. Education is a key element of the Safe System, including safer roads, cars, speeds and road users,” Horne says.
“With road trauma statistics currently heading in the wrong direction, programs like this is an essential element in helping especially exposed young and novice drivers make better and safer decisions on the road,” she says.
The RYDA workshop saw students participate in several sessions throughout the day to learn about road safety, including exploring key risk areas for young drivers.
These key areas include managing mind state as a road safety risk factor, the relationship between speeding and stopping, investigate and learn from a real-life crash, how to safely share the road with other road users, and the importance of speaking up as passengers.
Participants of the RYDA workshop experienced engaging and immersive sessions throughout the day that challenged the way they think about road safety.
Toyota Australia’s chief marketing officer, Vin Naidoo, says the brand is committed to making valuable road safety skills and habits accessible to all young Australians through its support of Road Safety Education.
“Toyota is proud to host and support the RYDA workshop at Altona, providing students with lifesaving knowledge and motivation to take action to stay safe on the road,” Naidoo says.
John Elliott, Head of Program Delivery for Road Safety Education, said Toyota’s support for the RYDA program demonstrates its ongoing commitment to road safety.
“Drivers are at their highest risk of being involved in a crash during their first year of driving unsupervised, we aim to equip young adults with essential road safety knowledge and mitigate this risk,” Elliot says.
“Without Toyota and our other partners’ support, the RYDA program would be financially inaccessible to schools and students across Australia to take part and gain fundamental skills for staying safe as a driver throughout their lives,” he says.
Since 2010, Toyota has supported RSE and its RYDA Program, which aims to provide evidence-based road safety education to young drivers and their passengers nationally.
RYDA is Australia’s and New Zealand’s most prominent and longest-running best-practice road safety education program for high-school students.
Since 2001, more than 800,000 students have participated in the program, including 4484 students from 50 schools in Victoria throughout 2024.
