LEWISTON — Superintendent Jake Langlais said with better busing logistics, he hopes to move past the transportation issues last school year that led to a lot of route cancellations.
“It would be nice to go back to sleeping at night and going back to only worrying about snow,” he said at Monday night’s School Committee meeting.
Langlais estimates he dealt with busing issues nearly every day last school year.
The School Department and Hudson Bus Lines did their best to solve problems and move things around when there were too few buses or drivers to complete runs. Some buses had to pick up extra runs to schools, taking on multiple routes in one day, he said.
The transportation outlook is better this year, Director of Transportation Alisa Roman said. The department is working to streamline its routes to better utilize Hudson’s buses and staff. Modifications to schedules could include combining routes and creating bus stops where multiple students from surrounding areas are picked up and dropped off at one location.
Establishing new logistics relies heavily on parents updating schools about where their child will be picked up and dropped off, she said. If a student lives at one location but needs to be dropped off after school at a family member’s house, schools need to have specific addresses to make sure students are transported to the right locations.
The department also needs to know if a student will need transportation at all, she said. She encourages parents to contact their child’s school if they are planning to bring them to and from school.
One aspect of transportation complicating logistics is students attending schools from outside the district, such as some homeless students or some in special education programs, she said. Those students might not live in the city but they have a right to attend school in the city and the department is still responsible for getting them to school.
The department also needs to work out transportation for students living within the city but attending schools outside their neighborhoods, she said. For example, if a student lives in the Raymond A. Geiger Elementary School neighborhood but attends the Robert V. Connors Elementary School, they would still need transportation.
The department has 172 students who have special transportation needs because they live outside the area where they attend school, she said.
Last school year, Hudson employed around 100 bus drivers but Roman is unsure how many the company has now. She said the company has helped more drivers complete required licensing and is also offering more robust work schedules.
As of Tuesday, Roman had configured 143 bus routes but she expects there will be over 200 total when she is done. She said she hopes to have bus route schedules completed soon but asks that parents be patient and update schools regarding their child’s transportation needs and schedules. “We are working all hours to get this stuff taken care of,” she said.
She encourages parents to have their child out at their bus stop at least 10 to 15 minutes before the bus is scheduled to arrive on the first day of school.
Bus schedules will be available on the district’s website when they are finalized.
Regarding other staffing logistics, the School Department reduced 61 positions, but most were vacant or were teachers retiring and would have been left vacant, Langlais said. However, no one was fired because of the reduction in staff. The staff cuts were from positions in all levels of the department, including teachers, educational technicians and support staff.
It also reduced some nursing positions but the department still has 10 full-time nurses, along with substitute nurses, which is more than before the pandemic, he said.
Students in grades one to nine start classes Aug. 30, while students in grades 10-12 begin Aug. 31. Kindergarteners and pre-k students start school Sept. 5.
For a full list of scheduled open houses at each of the schools visit the department’s website at lewistonpublicschools.org/en-US.
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