The BZA is the Board of Zoning Adjustment and GDS is obligated to abide by the terms established by the BZA, which includes a traffic management plan with the Tenleytown community. As part of our agreement with the neighborhood, we must abide by certain neighborhood street restrictions and we must require carpooling. Except in limited circumstances, students may not be dropped off alone on campus. All pick up and drop off is prohibited in the neighborhood (ANC 3E).

Our neighborhood agreement requires requires carpooling, busing, and transit. Students may only be dropped off alone on campus in the four very specific cases listed below:

• The student is in PK, K, or 1st grade

• The student has a medical exemption and has been given an approved waiver from the school each year.

• The student is dropped off before 7:40 a.m. (LMS Students must participate in the Early Grasshopper Program; HS students may be dropped off at School early) or between 9:00 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.

• The student has been identified by the school as being too far away from transit, GDS shuttle bus, and other GDS families to make it realistically possible to find an alternate way to school. These families will be informed that they are exempted from the requirement by the School.

For now, our neighborhood restriction does not require carpooling in the afternoon. At the same time, GDS is bound to a trip cap and afternoon carpooling may be required in the future if we cannot get our traffic below that cap. Every vehicle trip matters fro these trip counts, so please consider usign alternative methods.

All pick up and drop off is to occur on campus. Families are also not permitted to park on neighborhood streets to walk their children to campus, nor may they park and wait for their children in the afternoons. GDS Traffic is prohibited from operating on the following street between River Road and Wisconsin: Ellicott Street (except when exiting campus to the right), Chesapeake Street (between River and 42nd), 43rd Place, and 43rd Street, Fessenden Street. Refer to the parent-student handbook (pages 21-27) for more information.

Bus Registration is now done by updating SchoolPass Defaults. You can read more about that process here. The bus costs $2/ride for mornings and $6/ride for afternoons. Billing will be done based on actual usage. You can change registration by updating your defaults and emailing ImproveMyCommute@gds.org to indicate the change.

We have opened the "Move to Bus" feature on SchoolPass to parents. You can schedule a drop-in by using this feature, which is outlined in this walkthrough video. Please note, we cannot guarantee that there will be an open seat on the bus for a drop-in. Generally this is more of a morning issue than an afternoon one. If you are haveing trouble using the "Move to Bus" feature, there is a good chance that the bus may be at capacity. If this occurs, reach out to the Transportation team for help.

You may find the 24-25 Bus Timetable here. All buses arrive between 7:45AM and 8:00AM and depart between 3:40-3:45.

Most routes will be driven by full-size school buses. A few routes may be driven by smaller school buses. 

All GDS shuttles will be operated by GDS employees or by contractors who have worked with GDS for a number of years, including Coughlin, Middledorf, and O'Brien transportation. 

Not currently. There are a number of competing priorities in terms of getting students home (sports, extended day classes, performing arts, community engagement and service activities, etc.) and we want to live on a unified campus for a while before determining when the greatest need for a late bus might be, which neighborhoods it might serve, and whether the cost to offer it benefits our community in the long run.

The following are some factors that went into the decision to operate only one morning bus run:

• Resources: It’s extremely expensive to run an additional round of buses, and we did not want to significantly increase tuition for families.

• More Options: High School students may have more options to get to school independently, including carpooling, biking, and taking public transit.

• Flex time: Part of the reason behind the time change was to allow students to get more sleep. A second reason was to allow students to have more flexibility with their time. When testing out the flex time during the 2019-20 school year, we found that some students preferred to arrive early enough to work out, do homework, participate in mindfulness activities, or meet with teachers before school. Providing the earlier bus service allows them to do so.

• Siblings: Some families with younger students prefer that their high school-aged children accompany their lower- and middle-school aged children on the bus.

Aside from the bus driver, we do not guarantee additional adults providing additional supervision on any bus routes. Some faculty and staff may utilize the bus for getting to and from school, but these adults are not guaranteed on all bus routes. If you have any questions, please contact ImproveMyCommute@gds.org.

Since the Fall of 2021, families driving to campus have been required to drop off at least two GDS students at a time. If other commuting options don’t work for you, consider joining a carpool, which can be a great way to reduce the amount of time you spend driving, while sharing the costs of fuel with others. There are also other advantages like decreasing traffic in school parking lots, reducing air pollution, providing extra social time for children, along with numerou health benefits. GDS will recommend carpool matches once a year and you can also find your carpool match on MyGDS using the directory maps feature. Choose to view by map and click on your zip code to find the families who live closest to you! You can further filter by grade level if you would like to carpool with someone closer to your child's age. We also put together this step by step walkthrough for your convenience.

For the purposes of the BZA agreement, a carpool is any car with two GDS students and/or staff who are getting out of the car at the same time on campus. Having two children in the car does not count as carpooling if they are not both getting out of the car at GDS at the same drop-off time.

While GDS highly encourages carpool formation, it is your responsibility to make sure you feel comfortable with the arrangement and to make other arrangements if necessary.

When interviewing another family as a potential carpool partner, we recommend asking questions about:

• Other possible passengers or drivers (grandparents, caregivers, other parents, older or younger siblings, etc.)

• Driving habits and background (recent traffic infractions, typical route)

• Safety considerations (booster seat requirements, up-to-date insurance, etc.)

• Communication expectations (around running late, illness, concerns, etc.)

• Sharing driving responsibilities and/or payment towards gas costs

GDS does not run background checks, insurance checks, car safety checks, etc. on families. While we encourage the use of carpools, each family is expected to perform their own due diligence to confirm that they are comfortable with any carpool arrangements they may make.

As you consider carpool options, please communicate with other parents about car seat usage and preferences. Ultimately, we leave the coordination of car seats to the families involved and we hope other options such as the GDS bus will offer an alternative for families who may find it challenging to carpool due to carseat needs or preferences.

The only time you need to adjust your morning arrival information is if your child is enrolled on the bus and you do not want them to ride the bus for that morning. To do so, use Move To Carpool (even if you are walking/biking/riding transit to school), and move your child to your family's "carpool."

You are not able to add other families' carpool to dismissal defaults. We recommend using the Move to Carpool tool, select the other family's carpool, and set it to repeat weekly for the duration of when you'll be carpooling together.

New for 2024-25, all bus registration will be done on SchoolPass. You can access the registration guide here.