District transportation leadership impressed the Carroll County District Ambassadors at their first meeting of the year, reviewing with them the amount of work bus drivers do, the training it takes to become a bus driver and revealing a new technology that will allow schools to identify what bus a student is riding.
District Ambassadors is a program begun last year by Carroll County Schools Superintendent Casey Jaynes to involve parents and community members in the “behind the scenes” aspects of school life. They will see presentations on all aspects of the district and be able to ask questions of the departmental leaders and the administrators.
“The idea behind this is to keep parents and community members informed about the things that go on behind the scenes. You can be an informed citizen and say this is how this works if somebody asks you about this or just for your knowledge you can share with your friends,” Jaynes said.
He added that the ambassadors will “be amazed by some of the things they will share with you today, just to run the transportation office and get kids to school.”
This year’s ambassadors include Deidra Hays, Holly Frye, Jamie Cornett, Katie Walters, Laranda Barnhill, Linda Davis, Makayla Bates, Mary Esther States, Paula Rice, Richard Brooks, Stacie Darnold, Scott Nab and Susan Dukes.
Tim Crutcher, the trainer for the district transportation department, began the meeting with an overview of the number and type of buses operating in Carroll County. We have 26 buses on the road daily, 18 conventional buses, two rear engine, two special needs and four head start buses. “We are very fortunate that we have a lot of good buses on our daily fleet,” Crutcher added.
On an average day, the buses will travel more than 500 miles a day and go all over the county.
“I know some people are amazed by that. I was amazed by that because if you think about it, how in the world can Carroll County be that big,” he said. Crutcher noted that the route to Sanders and back is the longest run at this time.
Drivers transport 1,100 students per day - about 61% of our student population to and from school. That number and the miles traveled does not include field trips or other special activities in which buses are utilized.
Before they can even begin transporting students, drivers have to go through hours of training and pass a four-part CDL test. “We won’t tell you how to drive a car, but we will tell you how to drive a bus,” Crutcher said. “For example, in your car you may only have one hand on the wheel, in a bus you have two hands on the wheel and turn hand over hand.” Those skills are part of the testing required for bus drivers.
Ambassadors were introduced to a new concept that will soon be used by the district in conjunction with bus drivers. All students will soon be issued identification cards similar to those used by staff. They will use that card with the Zonar Z pass system to let the driver and school know a child is on the bus. The child will scan it when they get off at their stop as well.
“It will help schools identify which bus they’re located on throughout the day,” said Transportation Director Dianna Dunn. Each school will be able to tell what students are on the bus and where the bus is located.
“Sometimes we have a child on the wrong bus so we deliver them and that causes us to be a little behind schedule. It will help the schools to identify for certain what bus a child was on,” Dunn said. She also noted this technology will prevent drivers from being on the radio trying to figure out where a child is and people will not have to search for a child either. “This will tell us what bus to go to and look for that child.”
The Z Pass boxes are installed on the buses and should be ready for use soon.
Chief Operations Officer Mark Willhoite said the district will educate parents, students and schools on the new program. There will be a learning curve, but it’s really going to help us. I’m excited about it. I feel confident we will see a lot of benefits to it.”
The next ambassadors meeting will be October 15 when they discuss operations of the school district.