Rowdy Crowd on Bus

Monday’s northeaster was not the only hazard facing Fran Figueroa, a Springs School bus driver. At a school board meeting that evening, Ms. Figueroa took to the podium to raise the issue of overcrowded school buses and potential safety hazards posed by unruly children on her bus. Due to weather-related cancellations of after-school programs that day, Ms. Figueroa had 63 students on board.

The bus driver, employed by the district for the past eight years, has seen an increase in the number of students traveling on the school’s bus fleet, which serves kindergarten through eighth-grade students. (This coincided with an announcement by John Finello, the superintendent, at Monday’s meeting that school enrollment had increased by 15 students from last year and 26 students from two years ago.) Four years ago, Ms. Figueroa said, she had fewer than 40 children on her route. Today, she has “anywhere from 50 to 60.”

While the bus is outfitted to hold 66 students, Ms. Figueroa has 73 students assigned to her route, though not everyone takes the bus and she has never exceeded maximum capacity.

Of major concern is that her route, along with one other, has several rowdy students who need to be constantly supervised and policed. “It’s very difficult for me to concentrate on driving . . . while having to keep an eye on the ones misbehaving. It’s very stressful,” she told the board on Monday.

Carl Fraser, the interim business administrator, was quick to respond, informing the board and the handful of community members present that he had met with Ms. Figueroa to discuss the issue.

Mr. Fraser said that Ms. Figueroa’s request to place an aide on the problem buses was financially impossible. Instead, the school was investigating the installation of a video surveillance camera in Ms. Figueroa’s bus. The first quote received from a camera surveillance company was approximately $2,000 for each bus. The school is waiting to hear back from two other companies before making a decision.

On the phone afterward, Mr. Fraser added, “In conjunction with pricing out a school bus surveillance system we are conducting a five-day count of students on each of our seven bus routes. This will help us identify if any of the buses are regularly carrying 60 or more students. If we find this to be the case, the school will try to re-allocate students to less crowded buses.”

Mr. Fraser acknowledged that video surveillance will not solve the issue of overcrowded buses, although he believes the two are related. “My hope is that if we do find there is overcrowding on certain buses and we are able to move students onto a less crowded one, the activity of misbehaving will decrease simply because we’d have fewer children on that bus. And, if we still find a student who is repeatedly misbehaving, then the camera will be very helpful.”

According to the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services’ website, video surveillance cameras are recommended on school buses as part of the association’s goal to provide safe and secure transportation to school children. School administrators across the country seem to agree that when used effectively a bus camera can help put a stop to driver distractions from unruly student behavior, which can interfere with the bus driver’s duties and the operation of the school bus.

Barbara Dayton, president of the school board, echoed the sentiment. “I think the use of cameras on school buses is great,” she said. “Ridership is a privilege and anyone who is caught disrespecting this, especially if it’s causing safety issues, will have their privilege revoked.”

Mr. Fraser added that the advantages of capturing a student’s unruly behavior on camera is that it offers hard evidence in helping parents when a school must suspend their child’s right to ride the bus. During the board meeting, Mr. Fraser explained that today’s camera technology allows the school to obscure other faces on the bus, only identifying the offending student.

A school bus is not unlike a classroom on wheels. However, school buses often have more students than a classroom does and have only one supervisor, who happens to be at the wheel and facing the other way. Ms. Figueroa’s frustrations were clear on Monday night as she spoke of the added time it took her to drop off all 63 students, not only because there were so many but because she “had to keep stopping to get them to behave.”

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Correction: This article has been updated to reflect the correct spelling of Fran Figueroa's last name.