Each student must take a 30-hour driver education class. By state law, students are NOT allowed to miss classroom instruction except for good cause as determined by the instructor (may include a death in the family or an injury), and there must be documentation to support this. No more than four hours of classroom instruction may be missed. The class time cannot be made up, but the student will have to make up any quiz or test that was missed and will be given an assignment that is equivalent to the material missed. If more than four hours or two classes are missed, the student cannot continue the course and will be documented as "incomplete" on our state paperwork. They will have six months to complete driver ed or will have to take the entire class over.
Each student is required to have 10 hours of in-car driving lessons and a minimum of 6 hours of observation at a state-approved driving school.
Each student must complete the state-required driving log which consists of 40 hours of practice; at least 10 of those must be nighttime hours. At 15 1/2 students may legally practice driving only in the state of NH if accompanied by a licensed driver in the front passenger seat who is at least 25 years of age. The student must have on their person a copy of their birth certificate or passport.
If a student is under 18, for the first six months of holding the youth operator license, the student may drive but with the following restrictions:
If you are under the age of 21 years old and are convicted of a motor vehicle violation, your license will be suspended for the following time periods:
Note: If you get two or more speeding tickets as a youth operator driver in the first two years of having the license, you be required to obtain an SR-22 Insurance policy for three years from the date of your second hearing.
If you have questions about the New Hampshire Youth Operator License, check out the New Hampshire Division of Motor Vehicles website, or call (603) 227-4075.