Public School Drivers —
Building a Quality Workforce

21st Century Challenges
for School Bus Drivers

The public school bus is a mirror of the community. All the cultural, economic, religious, and social issues of drivers' communities get played out by students on the school bus.

If a community is awash in drugs and substance abuse, for example, the school bus driver faces drug situations every day on the job. To address these issues, drivers must possess special sensitivity and skills and must be given meaningful training and professional development opportunities.

Student Family Contacts

Changes in the family structure over the past three decades have changed the school bus environment greatly. The school bus driver must contend with gaps in the home environment that can cause problems, such as:

• The "absent parent" is one with no interaction and therefore no knowledge of their children's day-to-day problems. How does the driver participate as an appropriate "substitute" when necessary? What should the driver do when no parents or guardians are at home during pick-up or delivery of children?
  
• How to deal with the major issues that arise because of the new affluence and independence of children, i.e., dealing and using drugs, tobacco, weapons, alcohol, and sexual contraband, just to name a few?
  
• Hostility and abuse by guardians toward the children being transported is a huge issue for school bus drivers. Often hostility and abuse is transferred to the driver. The driver must use skills and training to build bridges with family members and parent contacts in order to successfully transport students. In many cases this requires conflict resolution between the driver and the guardian. Support and back-up by supervisors and administrations is vital if the driver is to function responsibly and provide the best possible environment for his/her students.

Student Behavior Management

Public school drivers often have to be able to assess and respond to hidden messages in children's uncooperative and disruptive behavior. This takes patience and care. The behavior may be rooted in complex home issues to which the driver can only superficially respond or affect. Some areas to consider are substance abuse, death and grief issues, psychological or personality disorders, physical, mental or sexual abuse, sexual harassment, and so on.

Student-on-student violence is a huge problem. Bullying is as old as humanity, but the ingredients of the violence are constantly changing. Weapons have always been an ingredient in student violence, but now a driver must contend with guns. Social, ethnic, religious, racial and sexual prejudices are the age-old catalysts for violence, and the driver is mindful at all times of their ugly presence in the school bus environment.

These challenges require professional development training that should be provided by boards of education in order to enhance and ensure drivers' ability to properly safeguard the children they transport. Discipline, order, and respect in the school bus environment is important and necessary for student/driver cooperation, communication, and safety.

Multilingual Challenges in the School Bus Environment

The school bus driver must deal with the same challenges as teachers when presented with students who are not native English speakers. Drivers do not have a classroom, but they do have a unique environment in which communication with the children they transport is both an educational issue and a health and safety issue.

Boards of education have long recognized the need to train teachers in multilingual issues and challenges, but almost never recognize that drivers also need training.

Student Sexuality and the School Bus Environment

Students' sexual issues do not stop at the home or classroom door — they are always part of the school bus environment as well. Drivers must consider the often explosive and difficult issue of sexual orientation. Often it is the school bus driver who first recognizes a sexual issue with a student based on his/her unguarded behavior on the bus.

The driver has a responsibility to protect and safeguard each child's physical and emotional welfare, without judgment or prejudice. Having current and appropriate information about students' physical, emotional, and psychological conditions is very important for drivers in order to deal with situations that arise between students.

Boards of Education must provide more and better resources for the school bus driver about sex education for students, AIDS awareness, and ways for adults to interact with gay and lesbian students.

The Unique Challenges of Driving High School Students

High school students are becoming larger, stronger and more hostile than ever before. Driving older teens is far more difficult than any other group of students and often more dangerous.

High school students often have a lot of their own money and are therefore more independent and willful than most other age groups. The keyword for drivers is defiant. Defiance = A Safety Hazard for the driver and students alike!

High school students are more inclined to be involved with drugs, alcohol, tobacco, and weapons, all of which carry a whole set of problems and issues for the driver.

In many cases with high school students, there is virtually no parent contact for the driver.

Discipline of students, and high school students in particular, creates one of the most dangerous situations for drivers. How to be effective, safe, and successful requires skill and training. Drivers need extensive help and information in this area.

One effective solution for school bus drivers is to establish mentoring programs among drivers in order to trade and brainstorm skills and deal successfully with difficult student/driver issues. These mentoring programs would establish a resource system for drivers in order to keep current on complex changes and shifts in the 21st century family structure that directly affect the school bus driver. (See Chapter 8 for more on mentoring programs.)

Transporting Special Needs Children

"Special needs children" present unique challenges for the school bus driver. They require a particular demeanor by the driver, and special skills and abilities that often are not recognized or trained by supervisors or school districts. Some of the areas of concern for these drivers are:

• Equipment training and skills, including wheelchairs, ostomies and other medically implanted apparatus, medications, crutches, artificial limbs, diapers, bibs, hearing aids, visual aids, respiratory equipment, aspirators, casts, restraints, seizure medications, allergy emergency kits, etc.
  
• Specialized training in medical and psychological realities, including respiratory, cardiac, gastro-intestinal, spinal, muscular, orthopedic, pediatric, psychiatric, psychological, emotionally disturbed, mentally impaired, socially maladjusted, autism, cerebral palsy, sexual or physical abuse victim, seizure disorders, etc.
  
• Drivers also must be able to handle specially equipped vehicles that often require physical strength and ability. Depending on the school district to provide for bus aides is often realistic. It may require negotiations or contract changes that simply don't happen. It also requires the district to recognize the need, and then hire and pay individuals for these positions.
  
• "Special needs children" require "specially and professionally" trained drivers. Without meaningful training and professional development for drivers of special needs children, including training and information about the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 1997, both the driver and the children are at risk. And as more and more special needs children get "mainstreamed," the risks and stresses for these children and their very dedicated and caring school bus drivers multiply.

To Section 5: Health & Safety – Protecting the Individual Employee