SAN ANTONIO – The new school year begins with school districts across the country, including those in and around Bexar County, still plagued with a bus driver shortage.
Despite nonstop recruiting efforts, two of the district transportation officials we spoke with say they will be understaffed.
In the Northeast Independent School District, students went back to class on Monday. Bill Harrison, NEISD’s executive director of transportation said currently the district is 30 drivers short. Considering at the start of the 2023-2024 school year the district was 50 drivers short, Harrison said they are happy with the improvement.
A week out from its first day of school on Aug. 19, Northside Independent School District has 37 open bus driver positions. The district’s director of transportation, Tesilia Soliz, also said they’re doing better compared to last year when they were down 80 bus drivers.
Both Harrison with NEISD and Soliz with NISD tell us their drivers will have to cover more than one route.
“Right now we have about 7 or 8 routes we double up. And, of course, as we hire drivers, we hope some of that goes away,” Harrison said.
“We’ll have to create double bus routes, but it’s less than 20 at this point in time,” Soliz said.
The San Antonio Independent School District, where students will return to school on Tuesday, is faring better than many districts when it comes to bus drivers.
“We had almost 100 percent return rate so; we’re doing good on our drivers,” said Nathan Graf.
Graf is the senior executive director of transportation for SAISD. The district currently has 130 bus drivers for its 120 bus routes, for which Graf credits a year-round recruiting approach.
One thing that all three of the city’s largest districts share is that there will be changes to bus routes and/or bus stops, especially for SAISD.
Graf said the big changes affect parents and guardians whose children used to attend schools that the district closed back in June as part of its right-sizing plan.
“There are new routes. Most of the new stops are going to be at the schools that were closing, so, that’s very convenient for our parents,” Graf said.
Almost every closed school in SAISD is now a bus stop where kids will be picked up and taken to their new campuses.
Some students attending Northside’s new elementary school will also be breaking in new bus routes.
“A few bus routes added to our newest elementary school,” Chumley Elementary, Soliz said. “And so, those children living in that neighborhood that are going to be attending Chamblee might have a new bus route if they’re eligible to receive transportation.”
Prior to NEISD’s first day back to class, officials worked to get the word out about where parents can get more information on the tweaks made to some of its bus routes.
“We had, I think maybe six or seven routes where there’s some changes. So the campuses all have that, and then through our online portal where parents can go in,” Harrison said.
All three district officials are encouraging parents to log onto their school district’s website to find bus stop locations, pick-up times, route changes and registration forms, if required.
- Parents with children attending Northeast ISD schools can look at this information by accessing the online portal from the district website.
- Northside ISD has its school bus information on it webpage under the tab that says district then transportation. Northside parents can also sign up for the district’s “Here Comes The Bus App.”
- SAISD officials are telling parents to look for and click the transportation department tab on its website and then click the bus stop locator link.