DPS rounds out Rotational Bus Service, Express Stops delayed

     “[Rotational bus service] is attempting to be equitable… rather than a child missing multiple days, not being able to have bus transportation, that hopefully it's only one day a week,” Cornelius Redfearn, DSA’s Assistant Principal, explained. 

     Before the implementation of this measure, some groups of students were not provided bus transportation for weeks in a row, due to 17 DPS buses not having reliable coverage. At the school board meeting in November, parents voiced complaints about elementary school kids left in the cold for hours, and their concern about inequity.

    “On average, for the six buses that serve Creekside, the disruption is about 25 percent of the time, but that goes up to 43 percent of the time for minority and lower income students,” Rebecca McDonald, a Creekside parent, stated at the board meeting on 11/21.

     The transportation department, in response, rolled out Rotational Bus Service only a week later from the meeting, immediately after thanksgiving break. With this short term solution, both resources and shortages are spread in a more even manner. However, one day a week and in some cases more without bus service adds stress and challenges for many parents.

     “It’s impacting families, certainly, because you have working families… [who] are having to make accommodations for their jobs in many cases,” Redfearn commented.

     Those students whose parents work or do not have cars don’t go to school on days without service, putting students of a lower socioeconomic status at a further disadvantage in their education. Additionally, having different routes is challenging for bus drivers, taking them in unfamiliar places.

     “My route that I’ll do tomorrow is a rotation route… they try to squeeze me on a bus that I know nothing about, I gotta go out there in the dark, with a piece of paper- that is very difficult and unsafe!” Paulissa Pegram, a bus driver for DPS, asserted.

     While driving a bus is a difficult job, many drivers stay for the community they are able to build with the kids they drive to school each day. The rotational bus service interferes with that basis of comfort for students.

     “My kids are like, ‘Ms. P, why aren’t you picking us up?’, and I’m like, ‘Baby, I don’t make the rules, I wish I could,’” Pegram shared.

    It is unclear how many bus drivers have left since the implementation of this service. It is also unclear if it is possible to raise wages for bus drivers, or why DPS is struggling with bus driver shortages more than other districts. DPS administration announced on 1/9 that their current plan is to work on retention, and that their recruitment efforts are proving successful.

     “The best recruiting is keeping the people we have… and that is the tip of the spear of what we are going to do to improve the work conditions, and keep our staff members working,” Larry Webb, Chief Operating Officer, stated.