![]() Oaks says he andKCS transportation director Ryan Dillingham revisit the question frequently. Still, amid all these changes, the district never reconsidered the broader structure of how school bus service is provided. Many don’t make it through the training and certification process Oaks says about 200 new people wanted to drive this year but only 75 made the cut. It already runs background checks on drivers. The district is considering taking over all driver training, Oaks says. It is among the 64 percent of districts that handle their own bus transportation, according to School Bus Fleet.Īfter a head-on collision between two school buses killed2 children and an adult five years ago, the Knox County school board and top administration revamped bus driver training and safety requirements in addition to boosting pay. It guarantees drivers an eight-hour day, overtime and attendance bonuses. Nashville handles most of its bus transportation in-house. Memphis, at least, isn’t having a driver shortage: WATN reported this fall that the district had 60 more drivers than routes. ![]() Memphis and Chattanooga public schools each use a single national contractor for school busing, for example. ![]() Although that’s about half as many as contractors as five years ago, it’s way more than most large school districts in the state use. Right now, there are about 60 contractors running 345 buses. The contract is used for five years with all interested companies that meet the district’s standards. The school board approves a new contract that outlines a flat fee for each bus: Between about $41,000 and $48,000, depending on bus size. Contracts aren’t bid out, said Russ Oaks, chief operations officer for the school district. Many of its contractors are mom ‘n’ pop businesses with a handful of buses. It’s been this way since the school district was created. But using contractors means Knox County doesn’t control these factors. Offering better pay, benefits, or hours are ways school districts entice and keep good drivers. County school officials don’t know how many bus contractors passed the increases on to drivers.ĭillingham said he’s confident the district is now competitive with its neighbors, partly because of the contract increases but also because of better infrastructure, like a powerful radio system that provides support to drivers on far-flung routes. Those increases ended this school year.īut Knox County doesn’t employ drivers directly. In 2016, the county school board approved three years of $1 million dollar raises for its school bus contractors, with the goal of increasing driver pay. Almost a third called it “severe” or “desperate.” Tennessee raised its legal bus driving age from 21 to 25 last year, further shrinking the pool of eligible drivers.įor a while, the Knox County school district was losing drivers to neighboring districts that paid better. So I am confident we’re moving in the right direction.”Ī survey by the industry magazine School Bus Fleet found 90 percent of the nation’s school districts have a bus driver shortage. And we have drivers in the pipeline now, which is not something we’ve been able to say over the past few years. “But it is not as bad as it has been in the past. “It’s not great,” said transportation director Ryan Dillingham. That’s down from 10 at the beginning of the school year. Hunter’s is one of five bus routes that get picked up and dropped off as a second load. ![]() The situation isn’t what school transportation officials want. “I get home really late, and if we have a lot of homework we can get some done at school, and some hard problems we need to do we can do home when it’s quiet,” he said. makes him late for activities, like Boy Scouts, and leaves less time for homework. But sometimes getting home shortly before 5 p.m. Hunter makes the best of the situation, which gives him extra time to practice his trumpet with friends after school. Other buses pick up the kids from his neighborhood after running another route. That’s because his bus route still has no regular bus and driver, even though a quarter of the school year is already over. Sixth-grader Hunter Simmons lives just two and a half miles from West Valley Middle School, but it takes him more than an hour to get home by bus.
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