as seats in vehicles. Tese standards provide guidelines for safe- ly transporting students who have limited mobility and sit in wheelchairs aboard school buses (
www.stnonline.com/go/888). Te WC18 standard concerns lap-shoulder belts that have ve-
4
hicle-anchored pelvic belts and how users should disconnect the diagonal shoulder portion from the pelvic portion. Te WC19 update addresses wheelchairs for children who weigh less than 50 pounds and changes the test for properly positioning restraints with vehicle-anchored pelvic belts. Finally, the new WC20 guide- line now recommends using a vehicle-anchored pelvic belt for the test and extends WC19 by allowing independent testing of a seating system using a surrogate wheelchair base.
Industry Reviews First-Ever CAFE
Standards for School Buses Te school bus industry this past year reviewed the U.S. Envi-
ronmental Protection Agency and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s first-ever CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) regulations for medium- and heavy-duty commercial vehicles and school buses. Tese are categorized as “vocational vehicles” and are spread across the spectrum of vehicles under the proposed rules. Te EPA and NHTSA in October 2010 made the initial an-
nouncement of these standards aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and setting fuel economy levels for commercial fleet vehicles and released the rulemaking last summer. Under the proposed standards, newly manufactured school buses must achieve up to a 10-percent reduction in fuel consumption and carbon emissions by 2018 (
www.stnonline.com/go/889). Diesel engine manufacturers for school buses said they have
been working proactively on the regulation for the past several years. Large school bus manufacturers all indicated that they ex- pected to retain their current diesel engine emissions solutions to meet the new requirements.
bullying is nothing new, but the movie showed firsthand what stu- dents face on the school campus and in the school bus, and aims to spur action by all involved to help combat it. Te school bus industry is definitely no stranger to bullying
issues, which is why First Student last fall launched its national anti-bullying campaign “See Something. Do Something.” to raise awareness and provide bullying prevention training to more than 59,000 bus drivers and attendants. As a result, First Student ex- ecutives in April were invited to the White House for a special screening of the movie and met Alex Libby, one of the students featured in the film, and Valerie Jarret, senior advisor to President Obama (
www.stnonline.com/go/890). In supporting Te Bully Project’s “1 Million Kids” campaign,
6 7
5 Documentary, Student Transporters
Target Bullying Head-On Tis year the documentary “Bully” helped continue to catapult this concerning issue into mainstream America. Everyone knows
First Student this year is volunteering to transport 1 million stu- dents to weekday screenings of the film.
Transporting Homeless Students
on the Rise As the Great Recession hit school district budgets, one of
their challenges this past school year, which seems to be wors- ening, was meeting the homeless students’ transportation requirements covered by the McKinney-Vento Act. Tis federal legislation requires school districts to transport homeless stu- dents to their home schools even if, during a given year, they are forced to move out of district to a shelter. McKinney-Vento has been flat-funded at $65 million for the
past five years. Meanwhile, the number of homeless students spiked this year (
www.stnonline.com/go/891). According to a re- cent STN survey of transportation directors and supervisors, more than half said the number of homeless students they transport has increased compared to the last school year. About 38 percent re- ported a decrease and 4 percent reported no change. Te federal regulations are being re-written to widen the safety net to include foster children as well as homeless pre-kindergarten students.
STN Celebrates Milestone,
Acquires TSD Conference School Transportation News this past Sep-
tember celebrated 20 years reporting on the latest in student trans- portation. In the September 2011 issue, STN interviewed Founder and Editor Emeritus Bill Paul, who recalled the state of the indus- try back in September 1991 and how he made the move to create his own publication that would be monthly to more
quickly
publish news devel- opments within
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