Managing a school bus transportation office is an extraordinarily difficult job - which makes it particularly daunting for newcomers. If it's your first time as a transportation director, there's a lot to learn, and a lot of factors to balance in your decision-making.
With decades of experience working alongside schools to improve and streamline their bus systems, BusBoss knows what works! These are our recommendations for the most critical aspects of bus routing that you should focus on early on.
What Are The Most Important Elements Of School Bus Routing?
1 - Know your students and their needs
Obviously, an overall goal for your transportation system is to move as many students as possible - and that requires having complete information on the students. It would be a good idea to run an audit to ensure all the students' contact info and addresses are correct.
In addition, make sure that you know all the students who are on IEPs or otherwise have special needs which must be accommodated. The last thing you want is to accidentally leave a handicapped student without a ride.
2 - Decide on your routing priorities
Today's bus routing software can take dozens of factors into consideration when building routes. You can optimize for time, distance, number of stops, and much more. So, you need to decide what your priorities are, and build routes around that. Keep an eye on both the likely costs, as well as minimizing the number of buses in use, if possible.
3 - Leverage data-gathering systems
Clean, accurate data on your buses and ridership is a necessity, because that's what determines your state funding. You should have computer data-gathering systems in place, collecting information on your daily routes, bus maintenance, student ridership, and costs. If these systems are in place on Day 1, you're much more likely to be filing accurate reports with the state.
4 - Get to know your drivers
The North American commercial driver shortage is real, and it's not getting any better with time. Your bus drivers are possibly your MOST valuable asset, and you should make time for them. Get to know them, and establish lines of communication so they feel like their voices will be heard. You need to help maintain their morale, or else they might be tempted to change jobs - and there are plenty of headhunters out there looking for dissatisfied drivers.
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PRESIDENT
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.