HEADLINES
School Buses Benefit Community, Students in Effort to Give Back
During the school day, school buses make runs
through towns and cities, delivering kids safely from doorsteps to school steps and back. But these yel- low vehicles can also take on a different identity as charter vehicles that lend a helping hand to deserving community groups. Durham School Services has been a long-time part-
ner with Special Olympics in communities around the country. “Volunteering for Special Olympics or other lo-
cal initiatives allows us as a business to give back to the communities we operate in and strengthen our relationships with the parents, students and schools we serve,” said company spokesperson Kristin Sattayatam. Te contractor donated services to Special Olympics Illi-
nois’ annual Polar Plunge event in Lake Bluff this past March, an event that raised more than $85,000. The buses transport the “polar plungers” back and forth between the registration tent to the lake. Durham is also actively involved in other community events such as food, clothing, and school sup- ply drives and other fundraising efforts. Meanwhile, NSTA for the past couple of years has donated thousands of dollars to local Special Olympics groups located in the host-city of the NSTA Convention each summer. Twice a year, Dousman Transport in Wisconsin donates
school buses to a local church that provides medical and dental care lo lower-income residents. “We may go to the local Salvation Army and pick people
up and take them there free of charge,” said Maagda Dim- mendaal, CEO of Dousman Transport. “We obviously can’t do everything for nothing, but we try to do our share to give back to the community.” Head over to the West Coast, and we find that school
buses can also give some deserving students a look into a world that they could never truly experience in the class- room. Te Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles exhibits rare and classic automobiles and has been provid- ing free school bus service to the museum in an effort to allow students the experience they might miss out on due to budget issues. “Our permanent and temporary feature exhibitions meet
many of the state mandated curriculum requirements for grades K-12, so a field trip to the Petersen is a great supple- ment to classroom activities — if a school has the resources to get students here,” said Clayton Drescher, the museum’s education manager.
Te program began in 2005 to provide underfunded
schools an opportunity to send some of their students on an off-site field trip to the Petersen. Te majority of students come from Los Angeles Unified School District, but the mu- seum staff also works with some smaller districts in the Los Angles and Orange Country areas as well as schools who pre- fer to book transportation through contractors on a case by case basis. Since the program’s inception, the museum has welcomed approximately 8,000 students per year from the Los Angeles Unified School District. “Field trips are opportunities for students to visit new plac-
es, to have fun with their classmates, meet new people, and learn in an informal setting,” said Donald Wilkes, interim direc- tor for the Transportation Services Division of LAUSD. “Their experience outside the classroom environment is a key to a thriving education.” Teachers that are interested in the program can visit at
the end of summer during the museum’s Teacher Preview Days to find out about the School Tour Program and how to become eligible for the Free School Bus Program. An autho- rization form is given to the teachers, whose responsibility it is to schedule the bus trip with their district or other bus provider and handle all logistics. Te Petersen Museum then covers the transportation costs instead of the school. “Districts have severely cut their discretionary spending
and many schools have literally zero budget for off-site field trips,” added Drescher. “Many teachers have told us that this is one of the few opportunities their students will have to leave their neighborhood, not to mention their school, all year. And the automobile is such a common facet of Ameri- can life that we can teach so much about culture, history, art, and science using the common experience of driving, riding in, or even just seeing a car on the street.” ■
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