The school bus driver shortage may have just gotten worse.
On April 25, 2025, President Trump issued an executive order calling for increased enforcement of rules requiring English-language proficiency among commercial drivers. This was shortly followed by an official memorandum from the Department of Transportation codifying these new rules, and empowering government agents to immediately place drivers out-of-service if they are found to be insufficiently skilled in English.
This is a reversal of an Obama-era policy, established in 2016, which loosened those restrictions - in part due to ongoing shortages in commercial drivers. Unfortunately, these changes may just make a bad situation worse.
Will New DOT Language Rules Affect School Bus Drivers?
In short: yes. School bus drivers must have commercial driver's licenses, and are covered under this policy the same as truck drivers.
Obviously drivers need to have some knowledge of English. However, under prior rules, they were only required to show knowledge of signs and enough English to follow orders from police or transportation agents. In addition, use of devices such as translation systems were allowed.
Now, a driver must be able to fully communicate with officials in English, without assistance - and officials are empowered to immediately strip commercial driving privileges from anyone who they deem deficient.
How Will These Language Regulations Affect The Driver Shortage?
Currently, North America is facing a severe lack of commercial drivers in virtually all relevant fields. The commercial trucking industry lacks approximately 80,000 drivers, and a distressing 91% of districts reported a lack of school bus drivers in 2024.
Fundamentally, any enforcement of this policy at all will result in even fewer drivers - and currently there are no policies which are aimed at boosting their numbers.
In addition, the directive gives wide latitude to officials when deciding whether a driver is proficient in English. The new memo lacks any hard standards, and seems to simply leave the decision up to the individual official. This makes the order ripe for abuse. In theory, a driver might be removed simply for having a thick accent.
So far, there have been no reports of school bus drivers being stripped of their driving privileges, but it's something schools need to be watching out for. We strongly advise districts take time to check for English proficiency among their drivers, and offer remedial classes for drivers whose English may not be up to snuff.
BusBoss will be following this topic closely. Follow our blog for more details! And as always, if you need help streamlining or modernizing your bus system, just contact us contact us to learn more!
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Sonia has been involved with BusBoss since the late 1990’s, and has personally overseen many projects for various customers ranging from large urban and suburban districts to smaller rural school districts from all over the country.