001okay good evening welcome to the bus rider safety meetings we want to start off just by apologizing we have some technical issues going on but we want to be mindful of the time and to go ahead and get started with the meeting my name is yolanda hamilton and i am the district's diversity equity and inclusion consultant the purpose of this meeting tonight is for us to discuss some safety concerns um so that parents are on the same page with the department of transportation in terms of the bus guidelines and things of that nature i would like to ask you at the beginning of this meeting there is the youtube chat if you can provide us with a check-in for our virtual attendance simply what you need to do is go into the chat you want
002to enter in your first or last name first and last name the name of your student and their bus number so we want to give you a second to do that also if you're unable to access the youtube chat feel free to email brenda benz she is the office assistant at the department of transportation her email address is shown here on the screen and again in the subject line of the email you can put bus rider safety meeting please submit your first and last name the name of your student current grade and the bus number and you can um just write down or document brenda's email address so that you can submit that following this meeting if you're unable to access the youtube chat also during this live broadcast you can submit questions utilizing the
003youtube chat or you can feel free to text six two 216-264-6621 that text line will send questions directly to my attention the text line will be only open for the duration um of this meeting so at the close of the meeting the text line will no longer be available so go ahead and write that number down i'll repeat it again 216-264-6621 so for the purpose of our meeting tonight we are um this is our agenda we want to take the time to review some of the ongoing safety concerns and issues also discuss the importance of having updated contact information on file with the department of transportation as well as your your building we want to take the time out to briefly review the bus and safety guidelines to hear testimonials from our bus drivers and
004also to talk how parents as partners can really be helpful to make helping us to ensure and enforce safety concerns for the district at this time i would like to introduce carrie burgles and she is over the department of transportation carrie will be sharing briefly about the safety concerns and behavior issues that we are seeing that she and her department are seeing ongoing um this as of the prior to winter break and this consists of several fights and altercations that have been occurring on the various bus routes the excessive use of profanity having students move around while buses are in transport which really compromises safety ongoing disrespect towards bus drivers and staff on the bus and also an influx in students not abiding by the mandates mass mandates and again these are ongoing safety concerns
005and they are in violation of our bus guidelines and i'd just like to invite carrie at this moment to chime in and to share some of the concerns and safety issues that have been ongoing with the several buses might be muted yes mrs bailey can you unmute carrie please i carry you're unmuted but we're not able to hear you you know what i'm gonna do a conference call with her is that okay you can't be heard all right do you want to put you on speaker okay i'm gonna put her on speaker on the phone so she can hear us okay that's fine okay go ahead go ahead carrie gary carrie go ahead we lost her okay go ahead go ahead all right go ahead they're listening i'm thinking she's having problems okay um it
006carrie maybe if you log off and log back in that might serve your um solve your sound issue and i'm gonna continue moving on with the presentation and we'll give carrie some time to log back on so again the bus guidelines were sent home prior to winter break um again carrie's the director of transportation and she sent those out it's very important for you to go through each of those guidelines and to review them with your child again the guidelines that are mentioned are what we expect students and parents to abide by as they are accessing busing privileges because again having the opportunity to take transportation with the district is a privilege and so these bus guidelines were reviewed to really ensure the safety of your students and they are not compromisable what that means
007is that there are certain measures that are outlined in the guidelines that we have to abide by according to the law so um for example as i mentioned with some of the ongoing issues having students be seated during bus transport that's a non-negotiable um there are other non-negotiables including not allowing parents to um get on the buses to talk with drivers or students for any reason again that is against the ohio revised code and law for parents to be on the bus so it is important that you read through those guidelines that were sent home that you take the time to review each of those measures with your child so that they have an understanding of the expectations that you have for them as well i want to also encourage you to please ask your
008child um in conversation to make sure that they understand what those guidelines are communicated because we want to make sure that they also know what is expected of them in terms of behavior on the bus so that ensures that you and your child are on the same page as it pertains to roles and ex guidelines and expectations also we are asking that you sign and return that document by january 7th if by chance the document was lost um in transit or you didn't you misplaced it you can again reach out to brenda or kerry their email addresses will be provided on the last slide of this presentation they will be more than happy to send you over an electronic copy you can sign it and scan it and email it back to either of them
009or you could also send it with your child to return to their bus driver and we can make sure that that gets on file if you have any questions concerning the guidelines again feel free to submit those questions to the number provided earlier in the chat or to submit them in the youtube chat i'm glancing i don't see any um parent questions or concerns coming in so we regarding the guidelines so we'll continue to move on what is the number to text a message again okay the number is 216-264-6621 thank you you're welcome okay and we have carrie joining us hello can you hear me now yes we can hear you carrie thank you thank you yeah i came in through a phone i don't know what was going on with the computer i apologize
010for that but um hello everybody um i'm carrie burkhold the supervisor of transportation at the bus garage i just wanted to go over a few of the issues that we've been having on the buses pretty much this year and understandably so i know it's been quite a year um very different to what we're used to uh but we still have to keep some kind of control on the buses safety mainly safety we've noticed a lot of times we've had students not wanting to stay seated the main thing this year is the masks and we're not doing it to be mean or because you know we like to see the kids upset it's safety safety we want to keep everyone healthy we want to keep everyone in school so to see that happen the math mandate
011is very important so that's really big to talk to your kids about a lot of loud yelling getting up moving and i know the kids they get out of school they went online if they could hold off until they get off the bus would be wonderful so those are some of the really big things that we wanted to touch base on uh mary will go over some of the stuff she's been seeing on her bus and brenda as well so if you have any questions please don't hesitate to call us at the garage or send us an email whatever you're comfortable with you thank you carrie okay so now we're going to go into our bus driver testimonial so if our drivers that are on the phone um again miss bailey we don't necessarily know
012you each by name but if you can um just indicate by raising your hand mrs bailey would be happy to unmute you and then we just want to hear from you in regards to what you're seeing on your actual bus routes so carrie i know we have miss mary jo joining us and are there other drivers that are on i believe she's the only one that was able to get on okay yeah put me on there okay hi miss mary jo if you can share with the parents just so that we can understand what are you seeing that's taking place on your bus but the children is very unruly um the languages they use i ca it's unbelievable um they don't sit down when you're driving the bus start moving they start moving they're always
013jumping up and down trying to cross over from one side to the other um again the languages they're using you wouldn't believe and the fights is just on you know it's not the way it's supposed to be they're supposed to get on the bus sit down and for 15 minutes that's all it takes so uh these are just some of the things and the parents is outrageous you know they they want to get all up on the bus they want to get up in your face about their child is being beat up or their child is doing this and that and none of them are angels believe it so that's just some of the things that i have problems with okay so miss mary jo if i hear you correctly you know having um some
014challenges with redirecting the students and their behaviors and also just communication with parents so again um to those that are viewing this is an ongoing challenge that we're having and so again we are really encouraging you to have those conversations with your students to go through the bus guidelines to make sure that they understand what is expected to them but also reinforcing to them in terms of the role of the driver and having respect for the driver and not um violating those rules by using profanity or showing disrespect to the drivers there was i actually had the opportunity to sit down and to talk with the drivers and again they're very um passionate about their jobs and their goal is to get your kids to and from school safely and when you have a few
015students that are disruptive that are walking around that are not complying by the rules that compromises the safety of all students that are on the bus and so again we just want to reiterate that we are coming to you this evening to inform you of the concerns because again this is a matter of um this is a matter of safety for all students so i just want to take a pause and to check to see what um there's a couple of questions that have come through um one i am good evening i'm watching the bus rider video the volume is really long we can't hear if anyone else is having that problem i would encourage you to check your personal device it may be on your end i believe that um the volume internally for
016our zoom chat is up so no one else has no one else has text about that um the next parent is asking are there any write-ups or consequences provided by the drivers that's a good question and i will allow on polls that to carry so carrie the parent question was are there any write-ups or consequences that are provided by the bus driver so that in as it relates to like the violation of the guidelines absolutely and that was all listed on the bus rules and regulations we sent home with the consequences if it's something like first time offense the drivers they do give warnings they do ask them nicely if it continues yes they will get a written referral um and depending on the severity of it which you will see on the paper um
017will depend on how it will be handled they all get turned into me i will call the parents if i don't get a hold we always send a copy home no matter what happened on the bus so after three times being told about the minor situation and being written up they will get time off the bus depending on the situation um and like i said that's pretty much written out in there in more detail of how it would go so if you got that look it up if you didn't get it in the mail call me stop up at the bus garage we can get back to you i can mail it to you i can email and see whatever's easiest for you um however we will do bus suspension so if there's a fight
018that's automatic if there's a fight on the bus both sides will automatically get time off the bus uh stuff like moving a seat or something like that we will give them chances but if it's something that continues we have to show them that we're not going to be able to have that it's just a safety issue if that bus has to stop fast and your child's moving seats at this time there's a good chance that your child will go flying and we don't want to see that you know our main goal is to drive your children safely to and from school so um we're not like it said we're not doing this to pick on any students or anything or make the end of their day miserable we just want them to get home to
019you safely so that's the reasoning that's behind those plus suspensions for continuous referrals thank you and again um if you have any more detailed questions you can feel free to email carrie or brenda again their information will be provided at the end of this um presentation so thank you miss mary jo for sharing the experiences um of the for this from the students and your perspective on the bus and again parents we want to work together we want to partner with you to ensure the safety of all students and staff okay moving on a couple of other things that i want to know with the mask mandate we understand that this has been a challenging um time for all of our students and families and we understand that sometimes in the russian but hustle and
020bustle of the morning you might forget your child's mass the district does provide masks for students but it's important that understanding is a resource that we provide but again we want to be um we want to be diligent with how we manage those resources and so while we are providing mass for your students we would just ask you to again talk with your students so that they know um to keep their mass because what we're seeing too and carrie you can chime in is that sometimes before even reaching the school the mass comes off um it's left behind on the bus and again for sanitation purposes but also safety especially with the spread of this new variant just again reinforcing to your child the importance of proper mask wearing and keeping your mask on for
021the entire duration of the bus route and the school day meaning wearing the mask over their nose covering their mouths and not just under their nose and we know that it is challenging for our especially for our littles because they're in mass all day but again it's just what we have to do to keep them safe harry i believe that that was another issue that you were seeing as well yes absolutely and we've tried to be real lenient with the math because it's new it's new to everybody especially the children little ones it's really hard you know for them to understand the whole reasoning behind it they're getting better the little ones with it however we've noticed now people are getting a little too lenient with it and we are handing out every day a
022bus will take a pack of 100 maps on their bus and they are gone for each bus they're going through it and a lot of the problems we're seeing is they see them coming out without a mask they hand them one they put it on they get on the bus it comes off before they even get off the bus so when they're getting off the bus the principal's handing them another map to go into the school they're not keeping them on it's just it's getting bad you guys it's getting really bad and just even with them having it down but they're taking them completely off we need to make sure the children are wearing their masks over their nose over their mouth we don't have a lot of bus drivers right now we're doing the
023best we can the drivers have been great with helping each other out and everything we can't lose the ones we have we need them we need your children there you know we're trying to make it work so if everyone really could push that issue with the children it's huge right now yes and it's it's very helpful because we are seeing other districts around surrounding areas having to close down because staff being under staff or being sick and so again we know that masking helps us to mitigate this a couple more questions that are coming to you too what are we doing to keep the chi the smaller children separated from the older children and also does this apply to preschool riders okay so pre-schoolers have their own bus we have all the preschool children going
024on their own separate bus or the vans now the kindergartners are on the regular buses kindergarteners we try to get to the front of the bus they have siblings on the bus we encourage families to sit together so we we try to have that happen but if they're a single writer kindergartner we do keep them to the front of the book we only have so many front seats so that everyone's going to be in the front seat but we like to keep them close okay we have a few other questions coming in as well um one one student one family wants to know can they submit one form for multiple students they only receive one form via mail i'm sorry separate forms just because they may be on different classes different schools um if they're
025in the same school or on the same bus if you want to add their name and just put them both to the same bus number they'll be fine but i'd like to keep them separated by bucks so we know who we're getting and okay so we like to keep them the form separated by bus but if you put like your different students names on one form at least indicate their bus number also um the second question was how are parents able to communicate concerns to the drivers for example if the child is having an issue on the bus should they contact you or brenda directly yes okay we'll try to avoid as much contact as possible with the drivers themselves just we don't want anything to get heated in front of children if there's an
026issue we really really recommend that they come and call us stop at the bus garage talk with us usually something minor and we can work it out and not only that it slows down the bus routes and then we get a million phone calls because the buses are running behind um so we do encourage you to call us and we need to set up a meeting with the drivers we could do that as well and talk together in the meeting room or something okay and then there was another question can we address timeliness my middle schooler has had to wait 15 to 20 minutes in the dark and cold for the bus yes it's been a rough year for everybody um we've had a lot of issues with the buses on time we've had to
027combine routes um we've had to change routes very rapidly because we block drivers so yes there are times we're running late we had a lot of construction when the weather was so nice hopefully now it's getting a little better because we've cleared up broadway with a mess for a very long time sometimes there's issues at the schools we get held back we try to do our best to get stick to the schedule if you're noticing it's been since the beginning of the year and they're coming ten minutes later you call me and let me look at the cameras let's see if we could work something out and change the time maybe by those 10 minutes so they're not as long in the cold weather okay and there were no there was another concern that came
028in from a parent regarding um um the bus and timing and arrival so again if that's an ongoing issue that you're seeing with your particular bus route for your child please feel free to reach out to carrie or brenda so that they can take a look at that again i'm also just asking for your grace and understanding that we have to be flexible with the shortage of drivers and also to kerry's point about um changing bus routes in addition um there was another family um daughter let's see hello my daughter writes bus 24 this is her first year on the bus and she's in kindergarten and she begs me not to ride the bus and says that the children are loud and unruly on the bus and the driver yells and talks to the kids
029in a way that she doesn't like and she said multiple times there has been three children in a seat i understand she's small however she speaks very well and tells me what what is going on so a parent just being concerned about um again as we all are concerned about some of the unruliness that goes on on the buses and again that's why we're meeting tonight to ask parents to partner with us in terms of enforcing those guidelines with their students also a couple of parents are saying they haven't received a form if you have not received a form with the guidelines feel free to reach out to carrie or brenda again on the last slide of this presentation their contact information is there or you can call the department of transportation and i just
030want to go over in terms of opportunities for you to partner with us parents as partners so having the transportation department partner with you as parents to really help to enforce those rules so we really would like to start a state a bus rider safety committee with the district that would consist of parents and representatives from the department of transportation the purpose of the safety committee would be again to work with parents to help enforce the safety guidelines as we have outlined also to maintain regular communication with the drivers and to understand issues and challenges so for example um that parent committee would be able to meet with brendo or kerry at designated times to talk about what are some of the concerns coming from the parents that are on this route and vice versa
031being able to share hey bus number x y and z we're experiencing this ongoing issue help us to reach out to the parents to really talk to children to reinforce the safety measures that we need to put in place right so basically working as a liaison to create positive relationships between parents drivers and the transportation department staff oftentimes we know that it's a hustle and bustle in the morning and afternoon parents have to get to work or their designations and they are dropping their kids off and just kind of waving and that's really the extent of the relationship that you have with the the driver and and the department of transportation we want you to know that we really um value safety we really want your kids to be protected and safe while they are
032um and having a good experience during their transport however we need you to partner with us by reinforcing those rules to your parents to your students excuse me and also to foster account accountability so there should be consequences for behavior just like at home there are consequences for behavior and also understanding that when these guidelines are not adhered to it compromises um busting privileges because those are the standards that the district has set to maintain safety and so there are consequences when those are violated so again um in closing i would like to again encourage you all to please also ensure that your contact information is updated and on file with the department of transportation and the school district this is very important in the event of an emergency or urgent issue we have had
033some challenges with contacting parents because cell phone numbers change contacts change and we don't have that updated information in our system if you are not sure if your contact information is updated again you can always reach out to brenda and carrie to provide that updated information because in the event of emergency of an emergency or an urgent matter we need to be able to contact you regarding your child so again that is something that in addition to turning in the form that you want to make sure you take care of as soon as possible again if you need any further um clarification on anything that we discussed during our time tonight you can reach out to carrie baldwell burgolds she's the transportation supervisor or brenda bend the office assistant their email addresses are here along
034with the number two the um department of transportation we want to again thank you for taking the time out to join this meeting again we apologize for the technical difficulties starting off please be sure to also um submit your attendance for this virtual rsvp for attending this meeting and um another parent chimed in a couple questions would it be helpful to create a parent committee for the bus a group of parents that meet bi-weekly and that was submitted by ms sheena fryerson parents can meet with bus drivers to discuss potential issues and build relationships with bus drivers and others um and if there's a shortage of drivers are there any job vacancies available so there are job agencies can you just can you direct them that's the where to um locate the job vacancies are
035those are posted on the job vacancies are posted on the website correct yes they can go break at garfield lake city schools website um bring those quick links and there is an employment section you can click on that it'll bring you right to all the transportation we have bus driver positions we have bus aid positions we also have van driver positions if you're not comfortable driving the school bus so if you do want to drive a school bus we have an obi and on board instructor that will train drivers and as for the parent committee i think that's a beautiful idea we would love to have more communication with the parents to meet with the drivers to know more from both ways you know what can help improve the bus and the transportation to them
036from school to make the ride closer for everybody so yes i am all on board for that if you want to contact me and we can start i would love to have a parent from every single bus to represent their school bus so we could all meet together we can do it at the bus grid i think that's a great idea okay so thank you miss ryerson and if you are still tuning in and you want to be a part of that please again reach out to the contact information provided here there was one other parent that chimed in regarding the safety concern my son is crossing the street at a bad intersection where cars are flying i'm concerned that one day he will get hit the bus driver just takes off so again it's
037important to be aware of your surroundings i know that um the buses when they stop they do put out the stop sign but you do have people that speed around that unfortunately so it is important um for you know for safety to encourage your child just to be aware when they're crossing i know that um carrie are there any of anything else you want to add to that um absolutely if you are the children shouldn't be crossing in major interceptions the bus should pick up on their side of the road so um please call us if there was some kind of confusion with that or the stop is not a step where they have to crawl you know we don't want them crossing if we don't have to so if you can call us and
038we can look that over um friend or myself could do that for you and we'll see what's going on there okay and again before we close out someone is asking how do we submit the rsv to rsvp to confirm that you tuned into the meeting so again um you can submit the rsvp to say that you attended by emailing carrie or brenda in the subject line you want to type type in bus writer safety meeting and you will just put your first and last name the names of your students and the bus number that they take okay i'm sorry go ahead can you repeat that i just would like to be on the parent committee yeah all in yes and also add if you would like to be on the parent safety committee so again
039um thank you for your time thank you for partnering with us and we look forward hopefully to hearing back from you all regarding involvement with the parent safety committee and again i want to just acknowledge and thank miss bailey for helping us to work through our technical issues i want to also thank um our building leadership we have mrs fremo from william foster who is on tonight and mr fording um do you have anything that you would like to share in closing i want to if so i would like to give you the opportunity at this time before we close out the meeting um no not really i just want to say thank you to all of our families who have joined us this evening um sorry for the technical glitches i'm not sure what
040happened um but you know i do think that um the kids are getting better with the buses um you know and thank you for supporting us when we do call you um and again we you know encourage the kids before they get on the bus when they get off um just proper bus behavior um so i'm hoping that um with our encouragement we will continue you know to um get the kids safely there are times where i know the administration team has had to ride the buses um because there has been you know some concerns um and if you could just you know talk to your children like we said earlier in the presentation about staying in your seat um on your bottom having your masks on also to the cell phones sometimes those become
041an issue with the buses um so just being very mindful of what they need to do what we tell the kids basically is please just sit in your seat get a free ride to school keep everyone safe um you know the routes are not very far the kids are not on the buses very long um but you know when there are behavior issues and so on they sometimes have to stop and go so again um mr and behalf of mr fording and i you know if you have concerns reach out to us as well we will try to help you um i do know that parents have been sending back those forms this week um carrie and brenda if you can give me some paper copies of them um parents and then parents if you
042need them just call my main office my secretaries will get them to your children and you can sign off and i know some of you do not have printers at home um but we can try to get you you know those papers as well but the kids have been bringing them back so whatever we can do to support you while keeping the kids safe and getting them back and forth to school safely is all of our ultimate goal so thank you yes we'll get your copies tomorrow at the school soon thank you guys also for the support you've given us appreciate it thank you and mrs bailey before we end the broadcast can you um can you put carrie and brenda's email address in the youtube chat okay thank you so again thank you all
043for tuning in thank you for your time we're gonna put those um email addresses in the youtube chat and again if you have any other questions or concerns feel free to reach out to carrie or brenda thank you for your time thank you thank you thank you