Needing the drive

You can’t get where you need to go if there’s nobody to drive you there.

This has become a major issue for Clarke Community School District. The school district doesn’t have enough bus drivers, and it’s not just for the regular routes. It’s become a problem for scheduled school activities.

“We’re really in a critical situation to the point where we’re not sure if we can make all the activities, and it would become where we would have to not attend or have parents transport kids,” said Clarke Superintendent Steve Seid. “It’s quite a commitment to be a bus driver.”

Seid said if a bus driver gets sick, the school district doesn’t have the substitutes to replace them to drive students to where they need to be.

“It’s been a chronic problem, but it’s becoming a little bit worse because as drivers look to do other things or have other interests, whatever the case may be, we don’t have the back fill to have them replaced,” he said.

Filling in

Seid praised Rick Perrin, Clarke’s transportation director, and other transportation staff for filling in when needed.

However, that creates a different problem of not having an official at the bus barn to answer the phones. The school district has had to hire associates to come in and answer the phones while the transportation director is driving a bus.

Here’s what the application and hiring process for a bus driver entails:

• Getting an Iowa Department of Transportation physical, which is paid by the school district

• Having a commercial driver’s license (CDL) with passenger and air brakes endorsement. This is for licensing to drive larger vehicles.

• Partaking in a background check, which the district pays for

• Undergoing a pre-employment drug test, which the district pays for

• Driver training with 14 online hours and three hours in person scheduled. This is a one-time occurrence the district pays for

• Random alcohol and drug testing

• Three-hour annual face-to-face training the district pays for

• Drivers are expected to attend regular in-services that other staff also attends

Seid said the qualifications are intense, but he compares it to being an airline pilot.

“You want somebody that’s qualified that’s flying that airplane. We want somebody that’s qualified that’s driving our children back and forth to school,” he said. “It’s one of the most important things a school district can do, is the safety and transportation of the kids.”

Drivers

Seid said the school district needs approximately five extra drivers to be available at any given time. There’s different morning, afternoon and evening times. However, the more bus drivers available, the better.

If interested, call the district office at 641-342-4969 or the bus barn 641-342-4892.

“We certainly don’t want our kids not to be able to participate,” Seid said.