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Helping Special Needs Students Adapt to COVID-19 Safety Requirements

Transporting special needs students always has some additional challenges, and that's especially true during the coronavirus pandemic. School bus drivers and transportation directors need to be making concerted efforts to help special needs children mainta..

Making Social Distancing Work on a School Bus

If your school is maintaining in-person classes during the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, your district should be doing everything possible to reduce the chances of disease transmission. This is a major challenge - especially on school buses! As a small en..

Reducing the Costs of School Bus Transportation

There's no doubt that maintaining and running a school bus fleet is one of the most expensive aspects of school budgeting. It's often the 2nd or 3rd largest line item in many school budgets. Buses are costly to run and maintain but are absolutely required ..

Encouraging Loyalty in School Bus Drivers

Even before the COVID-19 outbreak, schools around the nation were struggling to find enough school bus drivers to keep all their routes running. The coronavirus only made things worse. It's become harder than ever for schools to find and keep drivers, part..

K-12 Relief Funds: School Bus Ventilation Systems

Shortly before leaving office, President Donald Trump signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 into law. Part of this law includes over $54 billion in funding grants to help both public and charter schools respond to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Safely Disinfecting School Buses

For as long as the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak lasts, it's going to be absolutely vital to keep your school buses clean and sanitized. Buses will always be a high-risk area for transmission, so they call for high levels of diligence. Parents need to feel..

Bus Tracking Apps: Anticipating Parental Needs

If your district already utilizes tracking devices to plot your bus's location in real-time, it might be time to open up that service to more people in your community! Schools around the nation are beginning to offer smartphone apps to parents, allowing th..

School Bus Industry: Front-line Heroes

We recently saw a wonderful article from School Transportation News (STN) highlighting some of the most extraordinary things done by school bus drivers in the past year. The COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak challenged service workers around the world to step ..

Propane Autogas Eases Back-to-School Challenges

Of all the back-to-school challenges facing school districts in 2020, the problem of successfully busing students may be one of the most pressing. By law, every district must provide transportation for any student that needs it - but schools only have so m..

School Buses Deliver Meals to Virtual Learners

If your school is closed due to the ongoing COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak or only operating at a reduced capacity, it may feel like you're letting your community down. Parents rely on functioning schools for everything from childcare to meal preparation, a..

National School Bus Safety Week Includes Poster Contest, Public Outreach

During times of crisis, it's more important than ever to reach out to the public and assure them that their schools - and their school transportation systems - are safe. Fortunately, despite the chaos, the American School Bus Council (ASBC) was able to car..

Training School Bus Drivers for Worst-Case Scenarios

No one enjoys contemplating the worst things that can go wrong, but when students' lives are on the line, it's important to consider as many scenarios as possible. That's why it's so important to supplement your regular school bus driver training with spec..

Leveraging School Bus Technologies To Support Parents During The Coronavirus Outbreak

It's hard to even list all the ways that the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak is affecting communities across America. Many of these problems center on schools and school districts. On one hand, the rational response to a disease outbreak is to limit in-perso..

How Student Transportation Is Changing From COVID-19 According To The Experts

2020 was a year of crisis for many industries, and that certainly includes the student transportation industry. Schools across the nation were completely unprepared for the pandemic, leading to them having to make many blind leaps into policy changes or ne..

School Districts Try out Lighted Signs on School Buses

School bus safety is one of the foremost concerns for any school transportation program - and there is no shortage of companies trying to sell you upgrades in the name of safety. Sorting through them in terms of cost vs benefit can be difficult, particular..

Four Big Challenges School Bus Drivers Face

Being a bus driver is never easy, but the job has become particularly difficult with the COVID-19 coronavirus still threatening the country. On top of their other responsibilities, bus drivers are now expected to do much of the heavy lifting in protecting ..

Student Transporters Discuss Meeting Challenges

Contrary to the hopes of many, there's no sign that the COVID-19 coronavirus is going away any time soon. In fact, new infections across America are at an all-time high. This means that it's vital for school districts and student transportation directors t..

School Bus Alternatives for Special Needs Students

While the specifics vary from state to state, school districts are universally required to provide transportation to and from school for every student. Most students are simply transported on standard school buses, but there are exceptions - particularly w..

Keeping Your School Buses Clean And Hygienic During The Coronavirus Outbreak

How has your district updated school bus cleaning policies to adapt to the coronavirus outbreak? Providing transportation to students is a must, even during a pandemic, but school buses create a significant new potential source of infection. Any student - ..

Protecting Your School Bus Drivers As Schools Reopen

As schools look to reopen in Fall 2020 despite the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak, one of the biggest challenges will be in successfully adapting their student bus transportation system. When crafting safety plans, it's vital that one group not go overlooked: y..

Products That Fight Germs on Your School Buses

In the year of the coronavirus - and with most researchers suggesting it will continue to be a threat in 2021 - school bus safety measures now largely revolve around finding ways to prevent spread of the disease. Most schools are doing this with traditiona..

Barrier Installation Approved for School Buses

How do you maintain school bus safety, when there's a pandemic going on? Districts around the country are wrestling with how to limit the spread of COVID-19 within their buses, something which is no easy task. One proposal was to install plexiglass barrier..

Safeguarding Students Getting on and off the School Bus

School buses are among the safest forms of transportation ever created, but there are still times during a bus's route that the students may be in danger - and no situation is more dangerous than when students are getting on or off the bus. One of the most..

Drastic Changes for Back-to-School 2020

For better or worse, back-to-school 2020 is here around the country, despite the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak. Every district has their own solutions for how to continue providing education despite the coronavirus, but one thing is indisputable: drastic chang..

Virginia School District Adds Safety Tech to School Buses

If you want a model for how technology can be used to improve school bus safety, you could easily look to Chesapeake Public School District in Chesapeake, VA. As highlighted in a recent School Bus Fleet article, the district has made a nearly unprecedented..

Does Your School Bus Safety Plan Overlook Critical Dangers?

When was the last time you ran a tornado drill for a school bus? It's a simple question, but in our experience, a lot of districts get uncomfortable when you ask it. Now, if you can answer "recently!" then that's great - but too many districts tend to focu..

Eight Tips for Recruiting School Bus Drivers

We keep waiting for the bus driver shortage to end, but it doesn't. For years now, schools have been struggling to find enough school bus drivers to keep all their routes running, and still the problem persists. According to recent studies, 24% of district..

Indiana School Bus District Adds School Bus Wifi

New innovations in school bus technology are improving student management and helping to create new learning opportunities - innovations like putting WiFi access points onto school buses. These access points run off of cellular connections, and can be tigh..

Alternative Fuel Tax Credits Extended Until Fall 2020

The last few years have been rocky for the Alternative Fuel Tax Credits introduced during the Obama administration. These tax credits were intended to spur the adoption of alternative vehicle fuel sources, including alternative school bus fuels, as well as..

What Happens When School Bus Drivers Are Sick?

From the perspective of a district transportation manager, the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak came at one of the worst possible times. No time is good for an epidemic, but with schools already hurting from the shortage of school bus drivers, even minor disr..

School Bus Routing: Adding More Bus Stops

Schools reopening this fall are almost certainly going to be making significant changes to their buses and routing, in response to the COVID-19 coronavirus. If these changes are going to involve adding new bus stops - such as to prevent too many students f..

School Bus Driver Shortages in the Age of COVID-19

The problem of finding enough school bus drivers to keep districts' bus routes running is nothing new. Districts have been facing a bus driver shortage for years, without any real sign of the situation getting better. Now, however, there's a new factor at ..

National Academies Advises Full-Time Reopening of Schools

Around the nation, one of the most pressing questions being asked over and over is "Should we be reopening schools in the fall?" Every district in America is currently faced with what seems like an impossible choice: weighing the needs of children to be ed..

School Bus Safety During the COVID-19 Pandemic

For school districts planning on reopening in the fall, the next few weeks will be spent planning thoroughly on how to reduce the risks of disease spread. COVID-19 is still active throughout North America, so children need to be kept as safe as possible.

Five Tips for Restarting School Bus Operations Here...

Will your school district be reopening this fall, in the wake of the coronavirus? If so, one of the biggest challenges you're likely to face is the problem of running your school bus transportation system in a way that minimizes the chances of disease tran..

COVID-19 Impacts on the School Bus Industry

There has never been a more uncertain time for the school bus industry, at least in recent memory. The outbreak of the COVID-19 coronavirus has disrupted schools, businesses, and transportation across North America, and there are no signs of that disruptio..

CDC Considerations for Student COVID-19 Testing

What do you do if you suspect a student coming to school in the fall has the COVID-19 coronavirus or may have been exposed to it? Districts across America are asking this question. Fortunately, they have some guidance. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC)..

How to Setup Social Distancing on a School Bus

Are you going to be able to maintain social distancing on your school buses? If not, your entire district will be at risk of COVID-19 outbreaks. Any districts re-opening in the fall must take all possible precautions to maintain school bus safety, and mini..

New York City School Buses to Go Electric

For fans of electric school buses and other electric vehicle initiatives, there's big news to celebrate coming out of New York City. Recently, the mayor of NYC, Bill De Blasio, signed an executive order which mandates that all NYC government fleet vehicles..

Is CBD Oil Okay for School Bus Drivers?

With the rising costs of health care in the country, more and more people are turning to non-prescription products in an attempt to cure their various ailments. Among various alternatives, the use of cannabidiol (CBD) oil is growing, due to its seeming eff..

Six School Bus Winter Maintenance Tips

Is your district giving enough support to your school bus maintenance crews during the winter? Proper bus maintenance should always be a priority, but it's absolutely vital during the winter. Even minor breakdowns or on-road incidents become far more dange..

School Bus Safety Plans: What Might Be Missing?

How robust is your school bus safety plan? Of course, any school district will have safety plans in place for their buses and transportation system. However, these plans are rarely complete. Arguably, they cannot be - unexpected situations are always possi..

School Bus Drivers: Combating Distracted Driving

Distracted driving is a serious problem on America's roads. According to compiled statistics, nine people die every day due to a distracted driver, while hundreds more are injured. Distracted driving can happen almost anywhere, at any time, to anyone - inc..

Just How Serious Is the School Bus Driver Shortage?

For years, the education sector has been plagued by a school bus driver shortage, and there's no end yet in sight. All signs and surveys point towards districts continuing to struggle to find sufficient drivers to cover their routes. That's causing continu..

Four Tips for Improving Student Bus Transportation in 2020

How are you going to improve your student bus transportation system in 2020 and beyond? The previous decade has seen huge shifts in how schools handle their buses, as well as student safety. Now is the perfect time to start looking ahead, and planning how ..

Texas Department of Public Safety Addresses Overcrowded School Buses

Here's a school bus safety violation that shouldn't happen, yet it does with surprising frequency: running buses that are overcrowded. In Texas, for example, the Department of Public Safety (DPS) was forced to step in and issue public advisories, due to re..

School Bus Seat Belts: Implementation Strategies

Going into 2020, there are now nine states that openly mandate school bus seat belts within their school districts, and two others offering grants or other incentives. Numerous other states are debating the issue. While not truly decided yet, it seems that..

Ohio School Bus Safety Act Seeks Fines, Penalties, and Stop Arm Cameras

Without a doubt, one of the most serious threats to school bus safety is the problem of other drivers ignoring the stop arm. Every time a car blows by the stop-arm sign, they endanger students who are getting on and off the bus, with injuries or deaths occ..

Better School Bus Crash Reporting Procedures Can Make A Difficult Time Much Easier

While school buses are overwhelmingly safe for passengers, accidents do happen. No district or driver likes to think about the possibility of being in an accident, even a non-fatal one. However, when thousands of collisions involving a school bus happen ev..

Mississippi Early Replacement School Bus Program Aided by EPA Funding

Passed in 2010, the Diesel Emissions Reductions Act (DERA) was a forward-looking piece of US legislation aimed at reducing pollution on the nation's streets and highways. At its heart, it is a loan and grant program, authorizing the United States Environme..

Cleveland Students Petition for School Bus Seatbelts

At this point, it's become commonplace to hear stories of cities and districts deciding to budget for school bus seat belts - but here's a story with a twist. The city council of Beachwood City, OH, a suburb of Cleveland, recently purchased two new belt-eq..

Senator Schumer Seeks School Bus Stop Arm Camera Report

Right now, few issues are as contentious in the school bus industry than the topic of school bus stop-arm cameras. The issue of motorists illegally passing stopped buses is undoubtedly a major problem, with millions of violations across the country every s..

Tennessee School Bus Driver Uses Phone Behind the Wheel

When a parent allows their child to ride a bus, there's a lot of trust involved. They need to believe that the driver is going to protect the students, and consider school bus safety to be their top priority. Unfortunately, this is not always the case - as..

Virginia Funds Electric School Bus Initiative

In the field of alt-energy school bus designs, electric school buses have lagged behind many of the competitors such as propane or natural gas. Until recently, electric buses had been seen as too under-powered and too short-ranged to be effective as studen..

InterMotive Vehicle Controls Announces Seatbelt Warning System

Usage of school bus seat belts is growing across the country, with six states already mandating their installation, and several others contemplating similar laws. Along with helping to keep children safe during accidents, there is also growing evidence tha..

Improve School Bus Safety By Taking Proactive Measures Against Stop Arm Violators

There are numerous threats to school bus safety any time a bus is on the road, but it's hard to argue against stop arm violators being the biggest threat. Every time a motorist ignores a stop arm, student lives are put at risk. This is not an uncommon occu..

Training School Bus Drivers in Positive Behavior Management Improves Discipline

School bus drivers have to do several jobs at once while on the road, and one of the most important is maintaining discipline among the passengers onboard. Keeping students quiet and well-behaved is a major safety issue, and can help contribute to safe dri..

California Energy Commission Approves Funding for Over 200 Electric School Buses

Slowly but surely, states and districts across the country are moving away from diesel and towards alternative fuel sources. For years, it seemed like the best choices were either compressed natural gas (CNG) or propane - but these are still forms of fossi..

Four Tips for Stop Arm Camera Success

School districts around the nation are exploring use of stop arm cameras as a way to deter unsafe driving near their buses. However, a stop arm camera by itself won't stop bad drivers. BusBoss has some tips to help ensure the success of your camera initiat..

Texas District Implements Paid School Bus Driver Training

Across the country, one of the biggest challenges facing district transportation directors is simply one of staffing. The nationwide school bus driver shortage continues in full swing, with the majority of districts reporting that they lack all the drivers..

The Pros and Cons of Electric School Buses

The push to embrace alt-fuels in school bus fleets continues unabated, complete with both the Federal government, and many states, offering incentives to move away from gas or diesel. Previously, the conversation about alt-fuel buses mainly revolved around..

Iowa Joins 4 Other States in Requiring School Bus Seatbelts

For decades, arguments have raged over whether or not school bus seat belts were a good idea. The official stance was that school buses were already so safe that the additional protection brought by belts would be minimal, or even cause as many problems as..

School Bus Driver Training: Handling Disputes With Parents

Recently, social media was buzzing when a video went viral of a Denver parent forcing her way onto a stopped school bus, and getting into a physical altercation with the bus staff that ultimately required police to break up. This is definitely a worst-case..

School Bus Fleet: Proper Tire Choice & Maintenance

Are the tires on your school bus fleet helping or harming your efforts to run a safe, cost-effective bus system? Despite seeming like a relatively minor choice, the kind of tires on your buses can have a lot of impact on both safety and performance. Likewi..

National Survey Shares Challenges of School Bus Safety

One difficulty when talking about school transportation management, and school bus safety, is getting a handle on the big picture. Discussions of district transportation systems are often filled with anecdotal evidence, relatively few studies trying to loo..

Five Ways a School Bus Tracking App Can Help in an Emergency

Whenever the news reports on a major incident involving a school bus, it's hard not to think "What if that happened to us?" News of a bus emergency is excellent for reflecting on the district's own training and response policies. Would the bus driver know ..

School Bus Fleet: Air Conditioning Considerations

Do all the vehicles in your school bus fleet include air conditioning? In many districts, this is already the case - yet there are still plenty of districts playing catch-up. A/C comes standard on most new buses, but that doesn't help smaller or lower-inco..

Who Is Responsible for School Bus Safety?

Who is responsible for school bus safety in a district? On the balance, the only rational answer to the question is "everyone." Whenever some sort of safety incident occurs, there can be a lot of finger-pointing - but at the end of the day, protecting chil..

Five More Ways To Reduce Fuel Costs While Your Buses Are On The Road

At this point, most school districts are at least looking at green school buses for their fleet. The problem, of course, is that green school buses are expensive, whether you're going the upgrade route or to entirely replace your older buses. Not every dis..

Washington School District Buys Electric School Bus

Just a few years ago, electric school buses were thought to be a pie-in-the-sky concept. There were numerous technical challenges to overcome, with the biggest issue being the matter of pure power. Electrical engines just weren't able to produce enough hor..

PBS Documentary Asks Questions About School Bus Safety

When it comes to school bus safety, there is probably no more divisive issue than the question of whether seat belts should be mandated for school buses. After all, belts have been required in other pedestrian vehicles like cars and pickups for fifty years..

School Bus Drivers: Understanding Miranda's Law

In May 2018, a truly tragic school bus accident occurred in New Jersey. A bus traveling on I-80 apparently overshot its intended exit, causing the driver to attempt to pull a massive U-turn across multiple lanes. This led to a direct side-on collision from..

NTSB Calls for School Bus Fire Suppression Systems

In December of 2017, a truly horrific school bus accident occurred in Oakland, Iowa. A fire broke out in the engine compartment of a bus, sending dangerous fumes into the bus interior, and ultimately taking the lives of both the driver and a 16-year-old st..

DERA School Bus Rebates Program Applications Accepted

School Bus Driver Training: Working With Special Needs Students

Last month, a potentially very dangerous mistake occurred in Waterloo, Iowa: A school bus driver mistakenly dropped off an autistic girl at the wrong location. Unsupervised, she wandered more than a mile away and was found at a local Target. Fortunately, s..

Study Claims School Bus Emissions Influence Learning

There is ample evidence that the sort of emissions and pollution created by gasoline and diesel vehicles - like school buses - can cause significant health problems among people exposed to the emissions. What has been harder to demonstrate is whether or no..

School Bus Safety Legislation Considered by Congress

On May 17, 2018, a horrific collision occurred between a school bus and a dump truck on a New Jersey highway. It left two dead, including 10-year-old Miranda Vargas, as well as injuring everyone on the bus as well as the driver of the dump truck. Video foo..

Florida School Bus Drivers Now Required to Have First Aid Training

Any time a child dies on-board a school bus, it's a tragedy - but it's particularly tragic when the death would have been preventable. That is the case in the death of Terissa Gautney on Feb 28, 2018, on a school bus in Bartow, Florida. Terissa was a speci..

School District Settles After Biracial Student Dragged by School Bus

Most of the time, when a bus driver does something that endangers students, it's due to poor judgement. Occasionally, however, it can be malicious - as we saw earlier this year in Farmington, Utah. In a deeply disturbing incident, a 14-year-old biracial ch..

Improving Route Optimization: Review and Insights

Maintaining a school bus fleet is one of the single most costly items in a district's budget, but it's one which is absolutely necessary. Schools must run buses and must provide transportation to any families who ask for it. This places a big burden on sch..

School Bus Driver Shortage: Indiana District Turns to Teachers

School districts around the nation continue to suffer from the school bus driver shortage, with no relief in sight. It may even be getting worse. In a recent online poll of School Transportation News readers, an astounding eighty-four percent of districts ..

Retraining School Bus Drivers: Four Tips

All school bus drivers will spend plenty of time in training sessions throughout their career, with much of it mandated by local or state laws. However, sometimes you may have one or more drivers who need more intensive retraining to get them back on track..

Maine Passes School Bus Stop Arm Camera Bill

On June 17, 2019, Maine Governor Janet Mills signed Senate Bill 166 into law - fully legalizing the use of school bus stop arm cameras across the state. As with similar laws in other states, these cameras can be used to identify and penalize motorists who ..

Are School Buses Safe Enough?

Concerns about school bus safety are frequently a matter of intense discussion, particularly in the wake of a notable accident involving a school bus on the road. Everyone talks about wanting to make school buses safer, and understandably enough. Every chi..

5 Reasons You Need a School Bus Tracking App

How much oversight do you have over your buses, while they're on the road? If one suddenly came to an unexpected stop or deviated from its route without warning, how long would it take you to know? For too many districts, the answer would be "a long time."..

Atlanta-Area School Districts to Benefit From Propane Bus Grant

The push to move school bus fleets away from traditional gasoline and diesel is stronger than ever, and it's being championed by many major groups - including the Environmental Protection Agency. As part of the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act (DERA), the EP..

How School Bus Drivers Can Encourage Reading And Studying On The Route

Like many people, we were charmed by the recent Motherly article making the rounds about an Arkansas bus driver encouraging reading on her bus. If you missed it, a bus driver and special ed teacher named Julie Callison keeps a bucket full of books on her b..

School Bus Drivers Must Constantly Adapt to Changing Weather

While politicians may still argue over the impact of global climate change, few people on the ground still seriously doubt that climate change is real - and it's causing a lot of unpredictable weather. School districts and school bus drivers need to be pre..

3 School Bus Bills Signed by New Jersey Governor

In May 2018, New Jersey suffered a truly terrible school bus transportation accident. A school bus on a field trip collided with a dump truck, resulting in the deaths of a student and a twenty-year veteran teacher, as well as putting 43 others in the hospi..

School Bus Passing Legislation Amended in Georgia

In general, school bus safety laws across the nation have been increasingly strict and concerned with protecting child riders from other motorists - except for one strange anomaly last year. In July 2018, the state of Georgia amended its school bus passing..

How Would Your School Bus Drivers Respond If A Fire Broke Out?

On January 31, 2019, a driver in Tamarac, Florida, had to deal with one of the nightmare scenarios most school bus drivers hope they never have to handle - a fire onboard the bus. For reasons still under investigation, black smoke started coming out of the..

School Bus Transportation: Plans for Volkswagen Funding

In 2015, it was revealed that German car maker Volkswagen - along with all their associated subsidiaries - had been engaging in widespread fraud to cheat results of emissions testing on many of their vehicles. Ultimately, VW had been cheating going back to..

School Bus Safety: Preventing Onboard Fires

There are many aspects of school bus safety that a district transportation manager must oversee, but one of the most critical is implementing measures to prevent onboard fires. Fires on school buses are more common than people realize. In fact, the DOT est..

School Bus News: New Standard on NOx Emissions Proposed

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently made a significant announcement that may impact anyone attempting to manage a school bus fleet: They will be updating their standards on nitrous oxide (NOx) emissions from heavy engines, for the first time..

3 Reasons to Reduce School Bus Idling

When managing a school bus transportation network, there are a lot of factors to keep track of, and sometimes it's easy to let the little things slip by. However, in the case of school bus idling, it's a little thing that adds up to big problems! Your driv..

Threats Require Increased School Bus Security

In recent years, school districts around the country have had to improve security in response to ever more shootings, violence, and even terrorist activity. It's a dangerous world, and schools have to be prepared. However, all too often a district will foc..

The Future Of School Bus Transportation: Raising the Safety Bar

When it comes to running a school bus transportation system, nothing is more important than protecting the precious cargo onboard each bus. For a long time, transportation administrators had limited options for improving bus safety, but in recent years we'..

Will Propane Lead the School Bus Industry?

In a recent webinar, the President of ROUSH CleanTech, Todd Mouw, made a bold proclamation: "Propane [in school buses] is going to be the lead horse for the next decade," referring to its status as the most commonly used alt fuel. ROUSH CleanTech provides ..

Studies Reveal Added Benefits of School Bus Seat Belts

Are school bus seat belts a feature that would save lives, or are they more trouble than they're worth? For decades, the conventional wisdom was the latter: Buses are already so safe that any benefits added by belts would be minimal, and counterbalanced wi..

What's Behind Fatalities at School Bus Stops?

According to School Transportation News, there have been 14 accidents near school bus stops in 2018 - with five of the accidents occurring in November alone! Of those accidents, eight resulted in student fatalities - tying the number of deaths in 2017. In ..