Quote:
Originally Posted by Reggie Dunlop
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I'm going to play devils advocate here because I actually like this change. I live in a small town and my bussing was cancelled because of no drivers. The town is big enough that a large portion of it it not really walking distance for young kids. You don't realize how much of a s**t show it is until it happens. I had to change my work hours to arrange drop offs and pickups. The schools were not designed for the amount of drivers doing drop offs and pick-ups so there are literal fender benders every week and a traffic jams around town when schools open/close. I absolutely loathe pickups and drop offs.
Cruising the local towns FB page it is pretty apparent that the new training requirements made things VERY difficult to recruit drivers. Our school division has its own transportation department but not in our town. So people had to either drive hours each day for training or spend a couple weeks there away from home for the MELT course. It wasn't even a money thing because the school division paid for the training. It was just the training was too long, was not able to be delivered locally, and overly burdensome.
It is not like training is being completely thrown away. You still need to get your class 2 and "S" endorsement. I don't remember school bus training being a factor in any major accidents before the MELT requirements. It was a knee jerk reaction that sounded good on paper but it really messed things up for many many school divisions, parents, and kids.