Thumbnail photo by Persephone Rose
Melissa Endert went before the Del Norte Unified School District Board of Trustees two days after bus service to her children’s school was canceled.
Endert, who lives in Crescent City while her kids attend Smith River School to be near their father who is a special education teacher, said finding out at the last minute that the bus wouldn’t be showing up was a sacrifice for her and left many parents scrambling.
“That’s a hardship for community members who are not like myself, who don’t have a spare car or don’t have time set aside to get their kids to school,” she said. “The district stresses that students should come to school every day. If buses aren’t running they can’t attend school. If they come to school an hour late, they’re missing breakfast, they’re missing time and they’re stressed, they’re hungry, they’re anxious and they’re worried and it’s already a long bus route.”
Endert’s request to the Board of Trustees — to “look into the transportation issues” — came after DNUSD canceled bus service for several schools two days in a row last week. On Monday, routes to Pine Grove Elementary School, Redwood School, ‘O Me-nok Learning Center and Del Norte High School were canceled due to a shortage of bus drivers.
Later that day, DNUSD notified families that some routes to Bess Maxwell Elementary School, Smith River Elementary School, Crescent Elk Middle School and Del Norte High School were canceled for Tuesday. Pine Grove Elementary School had afternoon service, but parents were told they could expect a later drop-off time. Parents were asked to either arrange transportation or anticipate delays where noted.
Another speaker on Thursday, Maria Chavez, a teacher with three kids going to Del Norte schools, said there have been times when she didn’t know that a route had been canceled.
“I understand things happen. I understand shortages,” she said. “A message, a call at least saying, letting me know I have to drive them to school would be very helpful.”
The route delays and cancellations from earlier in the week prompted Board member Michael Greer to question whether or not an annual eighth-grade trip to Cal Poly Humboldt should be allowed to take place.
Listed as part of the consent agenda, trustees ultimately approved the use of two buses to take 85 students from Redwood, Smith River, Mountain and Crescent Elk schools to Arcata for a four-day high school readiness retreat hosted by Redwood Coast K-16 Educational Collaborative.
Trustees also approved a bus to take 25 Crescent Elk Middle School students to Klamath on June 4 as well as overnight trips for Del Norte High School’s track and field and basketball teams using district vans.
But Greer raised concerns about how the Cal Poly trip would affect the rest of DNUSD’s bus routes.
“We [hear] about not being able to take our kids to school or pick them up, yet we’re sending out all these field trips, which take our bus drivers and our buses,” he said. “I’d just like to be assured that we’re not sending out a notice to parents saying, ‘Hey, guess what, it’s now 6 o’clock at night and we don’t have any transportation for your kids.”
Josh Slette, Redwood Coast K-12 Educational Collaborative’s Del Norte pathways facilitator, who submitted the field trip request for the Cal Poly Humboldt excursion, told trustees it’s the fifth year his organization has hosted its high school readiness retreat.
Though he couldn’t speak for individual bus drivers, Slette said he had worked with a school district representative to ensure that the buses would be able to take the students to Cal Poly and still do their regular pickups in the morning. Slette said he was assured the drivers would be able to resume their regular trips the same day they bring the students back to Del Norte from Humboldt County.
“As long as we have people who are willing to do overtime that day, it sounds like it’ll work with the schedule for the availability that we need for transportation,” he said. “We’ll leave at about 9 o’clock in the morning and we’ll be back at about 1:30 on both days — June 3rd and June 6th.”
When Greer questioned him further, wanting assurance from Slette that the buses committed to the Cal Poly trip would still be able to do their regular morning and afternoon routes, Slette referred him to the DNUSD director of transportation.
Greer suggested that maybe things like the high school readiness retreat should be held earlier in the year “so it doesn’t impact us.”
Greer’s concerns prompted his colleague, Abbie Crist, who represents Trustee Area 2, to suggest recruiting parents to drive students to field trips and sporting events. She said she’d hate for them to miss out on those activities, but the district’s responsibility is to ensure students can get to and from school.
Crist suggested the district begin “cultivating parents” who can drive the district’s vans and urge them to plan in advance.
A representative of the district’s transportation department noted that it’s difficult for parents to be cleared to drive students to field trips. Because they’re alone with students they need to be fingerprinted, she said, and they also have to meet specific requirements to be able to drive them.
Mary-Michelle Cupp, a teacher at Redwood Elementary School, also pointed out that if parents are going to drive kindergartners, first- and second-graders, they’ll need to use booster seats and car seats.
Del Norte Teachers Association President Amber Tiedeken-Cron, who has long argued that DNUSD bus drivers need better pay, said that students go on the Cal Poly trip every year. Despite the distance, it’s typically a fast trip because students are eager to get off the bus once they arrive at their destination, she said.
Tiedeken-Cron predicted that on the return trip on June 6, students will be back in Del Norte County at about 12:30 p.m., while afternoon routes start at about 1:45 p.m.
Still, Tiedeken-Cron said that if parent drivers were available to her, she would have recruited them.
“Most of our parents are both-parent working households. I have a class of 32 eighth-graders,” she said. “Having enough cleared [for] vans is close to impossible and the Arcata field trip was us and seventh grade, so it was like 60 kids. We don’t expect you guys to have that many vans. I mean, that’s ridiculous.”
Andrea Wadsworth, who is one of the district’s bus drivers, said those who head to Arcata for the high school readiness retreat will come right back “because of the way it’s planned.” During longer trips, another driver will take a district car to relieve their colleague in the bus, she said.
Wadsworth said she loves her job, but she understands why it’s difficult to find new bus drivers because of the pay as well as the hoops they have to jump through to be hired. Among those hurdles, she said, is having to pass a drug test and ride with the California Highway Patrol.
“There is a lot to what we do,” she told trustees. “And to manage a 40 foot school bus — you guys have been down Kings Valley Road, is there any shoulder? No. Go down Lower Lake, any shoulders? No. We get distracted, we’re in the ditch.”
