software and provide advisory services that solve dis- tricts’ transportation challenges.) The HopSkipDrive survey of 500 parents of school- aged children around the country also found that 62 percent said driving their children to and from school or activities has caused them to miss work. “Among parents, more than three-quarters (79 percent) say they or their partner/spouse drive their children to and from school, and 41 percent of their schools have eliminat- ed or reduced their children’s school bus services,” a company news release stated. “(Twenty-one) percent say transportation challenges are the biggest contributor to chronic absenteeism, more so than family decisions regarding student health.” The Zūm survey suggests parents are searching for
more flexibility, with 63 percent of them saying their kids would miss less school if “more convenient school transportation options were available.” More than eight in 10 expressed interest in using a
mobile app to stay informed of their child’s location on the school bus and would use a mobile app to “know their child’s bus arrival time, similar to tracking an Uber driver’s arrival.” In fact, the Zum survey noted that, “Out of those who don’t use the school bus to transport their children, 40 percent said they would reconsider if they could track their child’s arrival and departure.” Neither Joyner, who was promoted to transportation
director of the Union County Public Schools in North Carolina, after 16 years in the department, nor Johnson, who is in his second year as transportation director for the Stafford County (Va.) Public Schools after serving in a similar position in New York state for several years and before that as a transportation operations and routing supervisor for several school districts in South Carolina, were surprised by those results. Joyner described the driver shortage as “our biggest struggle.” It’s not as bad as what it has been, but we’re definitely
not where we need to be,” he said. He attributed an uptick in applicants and success
retaining drivers to an hourly pay increase for all driv- ers, including a $20 minimum hourly rate in place of a previous per-semester attendance bonus. The move puts the district on a more competitive footing with sur- rounding districts and area bus companies. “Each semester, they could miss up to five days excused and get the bonus, but the bonus was never guaranteed year to year depending on finances. So, I asked them, ‘Would you rather have an attendance bonus or an in- crease in pay?’ The majority of drivers said, ‘We want an increase in pay,’” Joyner said. “We talked to finance and the school board and everyone agreed that we could pull off $20 an hour. Our existing drivers were making more
than that, and we adjusted our whole scale.” HopSkipDrive CEO and co-founder Joanna McFarland said her company’s annual survey “shows a continued need for inventive thinking, and a stalwart commitment to our students and parents, to work to overcome real, significant challenges like this continuing bus driver shortage. “It shouldn’t be this hard for our hard-working educa-
tional leaders when new options are at hand,” McFarland continued. “The current state of our school transpor- tation system demands we all work to ensure students and their families can access the same opportunities of education and school support.” Johnson acknowledged a “marketplace for the alterna-
tive transportation providers. “As with any new emerging type technologies or systems, you got to start looking at all those pieces. It’s a balance,” he continued. “Unequivocally, the safest form of travel is the yellow school bus. Nobody will deny that. When you start trying to dial back from that, how does that look? How can you replicate what makes the yellow bus safe in that alternative transportation space? The industry is working through that because I don’t think alternative transportation is going to go away and there’s a niche for it.” Interestingly, the two surveys revealed a gap between
parents’ expectations and school leaders’ priorities on bus electrification. Eighty percent of parents in the Zūm survey expressed concern about the dangers of diesel fumes and 64 percent said they believe it’s important to convert to electric. Meanwhile, 73 percent of school leaders told HopSkipDrive that electrifying their fleet is either not very important or not important at all. Johnson said the gap is not as stark as those numbers
suggest. “I honestly think nobody in the industry dis- agrees on anything that benefits the health, welfare and safety of a child. So, if it’s electric buses, propane, hydro- gen fuel cell, if we get there, whatever technology that’s going to make it healthier and safer for school children, everybody is 100 percent on board,” he said. Johnson, who oversaw the addition of five electric bus- es and supporting infrastructure at the Bethlehem Central School District in Delmar, New York, in 2021, said an issue is the practicality of deploying those technologies. “It’s not that simple. Now the transportation director has to put on his contractor hat, become an electrical engineer, figure out how to pay for it. In Bethlehem there was a team, not only me, but it was also the facilities director, our business official in the central office, the school board, the community. We were able to successfully deploy the project and it worked for that particular school system but the situation is different in
www.stnonline.com 21
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
