A driver shortage temporarily forced about five dozen Oak Hill Elementary School students to board their bus as early as 5 a.m.
Nearly 60 students at Oak Hill Elementary School started the new year off with less sleep and bus rides in the dark due to a driver shortage in the district.
Officials at Burke County Public Schools (BCPS) said with only one bus driver and two routes, 58 students at the elementary school were picked up as early as 5:03 a.m. and dropped off as late as 5:43 p.m.
“This is not ideal,” Public Relations Officer Cheryl Shuffler said. “The school is working on making the route shorter and asking parents who can provide transportation for their child to do so … Until a bus driver is hired, this is the option for providing consistent transportation to Oak Hill students.”
By Thursday, Shuffler confirmed that the district covered the morning route and the principal would be picking up the evening shift, returning the routes to their normal earliest pickup time of 6:10 a.m. and latest dropoff at 4:15 p.m.
However, the bus driver shortage still looms over the county, and the elementary school isn’t the only institution feeling the pressure.
According to Transportation Director Daniel Wall, East Burke Middle is short two drivers, East Burke High is short three, and Forest Hill Elementary is short an afternoon driver.
“We also don’t have any substitute drivers,” Wall said. “Our assistant principals are having to fill in when drivers are absent, or we have to combine routes.”
Along with assistant principals, Wall said bus garage personnel sometimes step in to help cover driving duties at the other schools.
The Oak Hill shortage comes in the wake of a bus driver resignation — a position BCPS is actively looking to fill. While they don’t expect more resignations this year, they don’t disregard the possibility.
“We do have a bus driver class scheduled for Jan. 20, but best case, it takes about a month to get a new driver through the class, a permit, on-the-road training, and a license (Commercial Driver’s License),” Wall said. “If others resign, we will have to consolidate routes at those schools or shift drivers around.”
The district hosts about four CDL driving classes each year, gearing up potential drivers and providing a pipeline to employment.
The upcoming bus driver class currently has 22 people signed up, but the numbers that attend don’t always equate to future employees, Wall explained.
“About 50% of the people who sign up for the class actually attend, and about 50% of those will drive for us, but some only drive activity buses,” the director said. “In the last class, we had 30 sign up and we got about three yellow-bus drivers from that class.”
Wall explained that the class doesn’t cost the district or the potential driver any money. The district incentivizes drivers by offering to reimburse them for their permit, license, and Department of Transportation medical exam if they sign a six-month contract with BCPS.
“We pay the total cost of about $500 for those items back to the people in their monthly check prorated,” Wall said. “So, if someone promises to drive for us for six months, they get what essentially is a $500 bonus.”
Starting pay for non-teachers is $17.18 an hour, and prospective bus drivers must pass the same background check and drug test required of all school employees, along with a DOT physical.
Wall said the hours vary, with a split shift ranging from 5 a.m. to approximately 8:30 a.m. and 2:30-5 p.m.
Attendees can expect a class-to-driver timeline of about a month, with more trainees extending that process. Road training appears to be the main bottleneck, since the DMV trainer can work with only two drivers at a time.
“If the person goes to the DMV the day they pass the written test, they have to wait 10 business days to do their on-the-road training, which takes about four days, then back to the DMV for their license,” the director said. “To get two drivers trained takes about a month, to get 10 drivers trained it takes at least 10 weeks as we also have to work around the DMV trainer schedule, and he covers two other counties besides Burke.”
Jacob Christopher is the courts and education reporter for The Paper. He can be reached at 828-445-8595.
