Behind the Wheel in Connecticut: Planning the 40 Hours

Before the first drive: the shape of the 40 hours

Forty hours is the number for every 16 or 17 year old, on any route. Who supplies them is flexible: parents, a driving school and a high school course can all contribute in any combination.

To qualify for the shorter 120 day permit wait, 8 or more of the 40 have to come from a driving school or a secondary school program licensed by the state. The school logs them on its completion record, known as the CS-1 and, on newer DMV pages, the EDEC certificate. Home-trained teens can drive all 40 with a qualified trainer but keep the permit 180 days.

A simple plan for a school-route teen: 8 hours with the instructor spread over the first month, then about 2 hours a week with a parent. That reaches 40 in roughly four months, which lines up with the 120 day wait.

• School route: 8+ professional hours, then a trainer for the remainder
• Home route: a qualified trainer may supply every one of the 40
• Every route: 40 hours before the road test

Before the first drive: who is allowed in the passenger seat

Only a qualified trainer may supervise a teen permit holder: an adult of 20 or more whose license is at least four years old and has never been suspended during those four years.

Home training has a ranking. If the teen is married, the spouse is first in line. Next come parents, grandparents, foster parents and legal guardians. Aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters, and stepparents, related by blood or by marriage, are a fallback, allowed only if nobody in the earlier groups is both available and qualified. So a 20 year old sibling with four clean years can do it, but only if no parent or grandparent qualifies.

During practice: what to work on

The DMV's teen rules do not set a separate count of night hours, which makes it tempting to skip. Do not. The 11 p.m. curfew starts on licensing day, and dusk and dark driving is far easier to learn with a trainer beside you.

Cover the kinds of roads your teen will really drive: a two lane country road, a merge onto I-84 or I-95, a rotary, parallel parking downtown and a rainy afternoon. Examiners watch reversing, parking, reactions to signs and lights, and how you share the road, so give each its own session.

During practice: keeping the log and signing R-229

The DMV offers a home training log you can download. Connecticut does not collect it, but it is your evidence if the DMV or your insurer ever asks how the hours were done.

What proves the 40 hours to the examiner is one signature: your trainer's, on Form R-229. Because it is signed under penalty of false statement, never sign for driving that did not happen.

During practice: the parent's own two hours

Before any teen license is issued, a parent or legal guardian spends two hours in a class at a commercial driving school. School-route families get it inside the 30 hour course; home-route families take it alongside the 8 hour safe driving class.

The class explains Connecticut's teen laws and penalties, which helps the adult enforce the passenger and phone rules from day one. No adult available to attend means no license until the 18th birthday.

On test day and after: school-run road tests and retakes

A number of licensed schools host road tests on their own premises and let students know when they qualify. If your teen passes at a school, hold on for two days, then carry the evaluation report from the test to a DMV office to be issued the license.

A failed road test means at least 14 days before the next try and another $40 testing fee. Spend those two weeks on whatever the examiner marked down.

If you are 18 or older

Nobody counts an adult's hours, but each drive still needs a qualified trainer beside you: 20 or older, with four straight years licensed and no suspension. Add the 90 day permit wait (unless you are exempt) and the 8 hour safe driving class before your test.

Adults are not required to buy lessons. Still, for a true beginner, booking two or three sessions with a professional usually costs less than a failed attempt and a second fee.