Aug 3, 2026 · 25 min · 10 segments
In this episode, we speak with Marcus Glasper, Director of the Washington Department of Licensing about their new driver guide. Host: Ian Grossman Producer: Claire Jeffrey, Chelsey Hadwin, and Kayle…
Marcus GlasperGuest
Ian GrossmanHost
As you come in the chat about an initiative that recently finished in Washington around your Washington Driver Guide, the I guess commonly referred to as the new driver handbook.
That you recently redesigned, updated, a little bit different in the sense that everybody's always updating and tweaking their handbook, guide, etc.
um you really took a real fresh look at it start to finish big overhaul tell me when this started a few years you tell me when it was but take me back to the the why meaning we're always updating we're always tweaking legislature passes a new law get it into the handbook but somebody somewhere said wait a minute it's time to look at this thing top to bottom how and where did that start
And I will start off by saying that our guide in Washington state really hadn't been updated in over 10 years, over a decade.
But looking at it outside of the general refresh sense, it really was an opportunity to optimize how we deliver on this guide to the residents of Washington.
And so this time around, it was really about how can we make the document more accessible? I will step back and say that you are right over the course of those 10 years, legislation changes.
And that was one of the things we, to keep up with that legislation, we were including errata sheets or addendums that also made this document quite cumbersome, very hard to follow, and not easy to understand by our users.
But adding on to that, we actually brought in a team member from the education sector, someone who was a elementary or middle school teacher and really kind of had us think and step back a bit about, you know, are you really providing this document where most people can understand it? Right.
And then when we think about the diversity of Washington State, we also have to think about different cultural backgrounds and populations being able to understand our guide and so they can also be safe fibers on our road.
So we know that translations would be one of the things that we would need for this document.
And so that was another opportunity for us to think about using plain language so that we can make the document easier to translate.
It started years ago, but it's really about utilizing less jargon, simplifying your terms, simplifying your sentences to make them where a sixth grader could understand it, right? So you I don't want to say dumbing it down, but you want to use the simplest words possible to get your point across.
As you come in the chat about an initiative that recently finished in Washington around your Washington Driver Guide, the I guess commonly referred to as the new driver handbook.
That you recently redesigned, updated, a little bit different in the sense that everybody's always updating and tweaking their handbook, guide, etc.
um you really took a real fresh look at it start to finish big overhaul tell me when this started a few years you tell me when it was but take me back to the the why meaning we're always updating we're always tweaking legislature passes a new law get it into the handbook but somebody somewhere said wait a minute it's time to look at this thing top to bottom how and where did that start
And I will start off by saying that our guide in Washington state really hadn't been updated in over 10 years, over a decade.
But looking at it outside of the general refresh sense, it really was an opportunity to optimize how we deliver on this guide to the residents of Washington.
And so this time around, it was really about how can we make the document more accessible? I will step back and say that you are right over the course of those 10 years, legislation changes.
And that was one of the things we, to keep up with that legislation, we were including errata sheets or addendums that also made this document quite cumbersome, very hard to follow, and not easy to understand by our users.
But adding on to that, we actually brought in a team member from the education sector, someone who was a elementary or middle school teacher and really kind of had us think and step back a bit about, you know, are you really providing this document where most people can understand it? Right.
And then when we think about the diversity of Washington State, we also have to think about different cultural backgrounds and populations being able to understand our guide and so they can also be safe fibers on our road.
So we know that translations would be one of the things that we would need for this document.
And so that was another opportunity for us to think about using plain language so that we can make the document easier to translate.
It started years ago, but it's really about utilizing less jargon, simplifying your terms, simplifying your sentences to make them where a sixth grader could understand it, right? So you I don't want to say dumbing it down, but you want to use the simplest words possible to get your point across.
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