FIRST TAKE Te Glass Ceiling WRITTEN BY RYAN GRAY T
his month we address the elephant in the room, or, in this case, the bus garage. One of the questions we asked fleet managers and maintenance supervisors in this month’s survey (you can find the results on page 25) was: How many of the school bus technicians you employ or oversee are female? As you might guess, there aren’t many — that we could find, anyway. In fact, of nearly 280 responses
representing nearly 1,200 technicians through Feb. 6, we counted only 11 females. Tey work at one of only 10 school districts nationwide. STN contributor Art Gissendaner thought as much late last year when he pitched the idea of searching
for female technicians, interviewing them and sharing their stories with our readers. Certainly women can be just as good as men, better even, in the shop. We received many testimonials of just that in a related question we asked of our LinkedIn group. For example, Michael Ragos, supervisor of transportation for Hopewell Valley Regional School District in Pennington, N.J., said that while he doesn't employee any female techs, he has no problem with them. In fact, he wrote, females are just as qualified as males. So, why hasn’t the glass ceiling been broken? Our intent wasn’t to get into the politics of or investigate the reasons for any gender bias, but the question begs to be asked. We hope that in reading Art’s cover story, starting on page 48, you’ll ponder why women make indelible marks on nearly all other aspects of student transportation (bus drivers, dispatchers, routers, supervisors, directors, business owners, etc.) except in the garage.
“Historically speaking, the vehicle mechanic profession has been a male-dominated one. But there are certainly female techs out there, and mighty good ones at that.”
Historically speaking, the vehicle mechanic profession has been a male-dominated one. But there are
certainly female techs out there, and mighty good ones at that, as Art reports. Te shop I take my car to employs a female, and I always find her knowledgeable and honest in her work. Of the survey responses, I was intrigued to discover that a couple of districts not only employ a female
technician, but several, both as traditional mechanics and in hybrid positions. Mesa Unified School District in the Phoenix area is not only on the cutting edge of propane school buses, as it has pledged to eventually convert its entire fleet to the alternative fuel, but it also employs three females in the garage. Transportation Director Ron Latko told me one of the women is an assistant mechanic who performs a variety of work, including service calls. Te other two primarily work on seat upholstery, but they are also involved in parts. In January, I visited one of the five Los Angeles Unified School District five school bus garages, where I
met Aneliese Hessekiel, an auto parts shopkeeper for the Sun Valley location. One of three employees who maintain the parts inventory there, the other two being men, Hessekiel performs one of the most important jobs in the entire maintenance process — keeping the garage and the technicians supplied with the tools and parts they need. She had just celebrated her 30th anniversary with the district a month before, so she could also speak to the evolution of how school buses are maintained, and the technology that goes into them. Hessekiel is representative of the many females who directly support maintenance operations without
actually crawling underneath the bus. Of course, keeping school buses properly maintained and in the best operating shape directly impact student safety on the road just as much as any training programs. Good driving behavior, as we learn in Michelle Fisher's article on page 54, also plays a vital role in keeping buses in tip-top shape. Females drive student transportation operations both figuratively and literally. It’s about time they do the same with regard to fleet maintenance.
12 School Transportation News March 2014
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