Yesterday, students promptly loaded onto their buses at 2:15 p.m., listening to music, talking with their friends and gazing longingly out of the bus’s windows. Today, they sit in the noisy cafeteria for nearly an hour as they wait for the next available bus to pick them up.
The leading cause of long-term transportation issues, not only in Hazelwood but in America, is a school bus driver shortage. This specific shortage causes many problems because there aren’t enough bus drivers to transport every child to and from school on time.
According to the Economic Policy institute, “The bus driver shortage remains severe. As of September 2024, there were 12.2% fewer school bus drivers on the road than in September 2019. ”
To counter the shortage, Hazelwood schools are using the double-back bus method. This is when a bus either temporarily or permanently has no driver to take the students home, so another driver completes their route first and then goes back to the school to complete the unoccupied route. Because these occur before and after school, the time that students arrive and the time that they leave school are delayed.
Hazelwood West is one of the St. Louis public schools dealing with major transportation issues. There have only been two days this school year when there were no double-back buses at the end of the school day; it’s so common that a list of double-backs is emailed to teachers every day to inform their classes. Because these transportation issues have been ongoing, many students have had to deal with a late bus in the morning or afternoon at some point in their high school experience.
“It really made me frustrated, because some mornings when I’d have a doubleback I would have to wait outside in the cold for 15-30 minutes and my hands would be freezing.” Shahed Motan, 10, said.
“Sometimes having a late bus would cause me to miss most of my first-period class, and then I would miss work or get marked as absent.” Said Motan.
Sometimes, a replacement for the vacant bus route is found quickly, allowing students to have a regular and timely route for the rest of the school year. However, in Motan’s and many others’ cases, the number of times that their bus route had transportation issues increased throughout the school year.
“I had a double back for around three months.” Laila McGhee, 10, said. “Last year, I had a double-back for more than half of the school year.” Ghena Motan, 10, added.
For some people, it is simple to call a parent or guardian to pick them up from school so that they don’t have to wait 30 minutes for the double-back. However, others don’t have that option and they have to wait from 2:15 p.m. until the next available bus driver picks them up. On top of that, the time that it takes for the bus to drive them home may already be lengthy. So some students aren’t getting home until more than an hour after school ends.
“I think that the latest time the bus picked me up from school was around 3 p.m.” McGhee said. “The latest the bus picked me up was at 2:40 p.m.” Motan agreed. “Having a double-back bus was more of an inconvenience than anything else. It made me unsure of whether or not I’d get home at a reasonable time every day, which affected my ability to do homework in a timely manner, do my chores on time, and wasted the overall amount of time I had to relax after school.” McGhee said.
