20th Anniversary Commemorative Issue
School buses provide the United States with ten billion student rides annually.
SCHOOL TRANSPORTATION NEWS STN September 2011
INSIDE HEADLINES
Southeastern States Pupil Transportation Conference Recap, page 16
Chicago Public Schools Launches GPS, Routing Upgrade, page 16
Denver Public Schools Launches Shuttle Service at Start Up, page 16
Hawaii Raises Transit Fares Amid School Bus Cuts, page 18
Social Media Policies for Student Transporters, page 20
Routes Around the World: School Buses in Nicaragua, page 22
Readers Weigh in on How Drivers Receive Training, page 24
Why Booster Seats Should Not Be Used in School Buses, page 26
Preparing for Winter Routes, page 28 FEATURES
Recap of the 18th Annual STN EXPO, page 30
Bridging the Communication Gap Between Student
Transporters & Parents, page 38 Revolution in Seating Technology
Made Available to Industry, page 40 ANALYSIS
TSA’s William Arrington: Lessons Learned Since 9/11, page 44
Cheri Clymer: What
Student Transporters Can Learn from Mother Nature, page 46
Ned Einstein: State-to-State
Variances in Crossing Procedures, page 48 DEPARTMENTS
Advertiser Index
...........................page 50 Products & Solutions
...................page 51 Upcoming Events
.........................page 51 Classified Advertising
..................page 52 Editorial
........................................page 54
Serving the Nation’s School Transportation Needs
Looking Back 20 Years Q&A with SCHOOL TRANSPORTATION NEWS Founder Bill Paul, who recalls the origins of the magazine and how the industry has evolved – and has stayed the same
Do you remember September 1991? Tink back and you’ll certainly recall that President
George H.W. Bush was entering the home stretch of his time in the Oval Office. His counterpart in the Soviet Union, Mikail Gorbachev, had just survived a coup attempt. A solid 15 years before the Great Recession, as
it would become known, Te New York Times published an article noting that four out of every 10 counties in the United States with populations of more than 100,000 were facing average deficits of $8.3 million, with Philadelphia County heading the list by trying to plug a $219 million hole. Earlier that same year, China had sentenced two dissidents accused of masterminding the pro-Democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square. As history would have it, and is
still the case,
the student transportation industry was also at a crossroads. At the top of the list was the emergence of a new publication dedicated to reporting on child safety during transportation to and from school: the aptly named School Transportation News. On the cover of issue No. 1 was an article recounting an NHTSA study of 13 years of crash data from 1977 through 1989. Te result was that “occupants of other vehicles involved in crashes with bus body type vehicles are most likely to be fatally injured.” “A lot of this involves the basic laws of physics,” said
Charlie Gauthier, then NHTSA’s school bus administrator and later executive director of the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services until his retirement in January 2006. “If a 3,000-pound car collides with a 30,000-pound [fully loaded] school bus, guess what happens.” Meanwhile, the Massachusetts Legislature eliminated transportation
mandated for regular education
students in grades seven through 12 who lived two or more miles from school. Te move was in response to a 9 percent cut made to the state’s budget. Ten there was a story from Hartford, Conn., site of
the 21st National School Bus Road-eo, where Phyllis Meides of Alden (N.Y.) Central School District had just
Volume X Number 9, $3.00
Bill Paul reminisces with “Issue No. 1” of SCHOOL TRANSPORTATION NEWS, which he launched 20 years ago this month.
taken home the first-place trophy. Also, the European Economic Community was working with the new organization ANATEEP to sponsor the first-ever student transportation conference for member countries. Fast-forward two decades and the magazine has
undergone several facelifts, culminating in a transition to a full magazine format in July 2005. We recently sat down with STN Editor Emeritus Bill Paul to talk about how he got the idea to bring a second dedicated magazine to the industry and how the industry has changed — and remained the same.
School Transportation News: You’d been the
editor/publisher of School Bus Fleet and Metro magazines for nine years. What prompted you to start thinking about a new publication for the school bus industry? Bill Paul: Te idea started percolating in my mind
about 1990. I felt a growing frustration with the slow pace of reporting industry news. As you said, I’d been with School Bus Fleet for a number of years and it was a terrific publication, but at the time, it was bimonthly. Tat meant articles about news developments in the
fast-paced school bus industry might appear in print two, three or even four months after they occurred.
Continued on pg. 6 ➝
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