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EVANSVILLE − Parents at Evansville Vanderburgh School Corp. se are turning to social media to express frustration at getting a seat on the school bus for their children and realizing they are alone.
The start of the 2022-2023 school year is less than 3 weeks away. But some parents say they are struggling to choose arrangements after their requests for school bus seats were denied.
When a parent posted an article about the factor on the social media platform Nextdoor this week, dozens of parents and others commented. Many said they either knew they had the same problem, even when they requested bus transportation on the first day to check in.
“It will cause a lot of trouble. As far as I know, many families are in the same situation,” the original poster read.
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Many of those who commented had young people in the best schools in the north or in the best schools or other schools in north Vanderburgh County where walking to school is not an available option.
“This is where it’s so densely populated now,” said Jason Woebkenberg, an EVSC spokesman.
This is the third year that the EVSC has used an application procedure for buses, he said.
“We started doing this because of a national shortage of bus drivers. We have lost many drivers compared to the pre-pandemic era and this leads to a relief in bus capacity,” he said. “It’s a direct result of that. “
In April, Superintendent David Smith told the EVSC School Board that there are now 50 fewer bus drivers than the COVID-19 pandemic.
The EVSC has been running to counter the problem, raising the wages of drivers and other workers this year and advertising more drivers, Woebkenberg said.
The pay scale for bus drivers starts at $17. 68 per hour and peaks at $24. 45 per hour, he said. They can also earn $17. 34 per hour for other errands, such as extracurricular activities.
Drivers are guaranteed to pay at least 4 hours a day and get full-time benefits, Woebkenberg said. In addition, new drivers can choose between a permanent address or an emergency trip if they prefer a more flexible schedule.
Some bus lines in the city have been condensed so drivers can make routes in the northern component of the county, he said.
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School transportation officers are lately in the process of arranging bus routes for the year. As part of the procedure, last week, EVSC began informing parents if their students were on a waiting list.
While there were about 450 students waiting last Friday, Woebkenberg said school transportation officials had removed more than a hundred students from the list so far this week.
“We have already made a significant gap in the waiting list and there are still two and a half weeks to go before the school year begins. We are contemplating every solution imaginable,” he said.
Bus assignments were discovered for about 96 percent of the academics who applied, he said.
Mark Wilson covers education and the Courier
This article was originally published on Evansville Courier