McLean’s school bus-induced tardiness is a longstanding problem, causing many students to miss rides to and from school. However, as of recently, the issue has worsened and it can no longer be ignored. McLean’s school bus system impedes students’ ability to succeed in their environment by harming their school experiences.
Bus inconveniences are the norm for many McLean students. My own bus time constantly fluctuates, and sometimes it comes four to five minutes earlier, resulting in many students missing it, or it comes way delayed which causes inconveniences for many families. Even just based on observation, sometimes only three or four students make it onto the bus, when our stop usually has around eight.
These issues cause discomfort for both families and students as they are forced to find alternative ways to drive to school. The longer students must wait, the more information they are bound to miss in class.
“I’m always worried if I’m going to make it to school on time, especially if I have something important that day,” sophomore Elle Dogel said.
According to an FCPS spokesperson, bus delays of at least 10 minutes are placed on the FCPS bus delay website and families are informed through eNotify, which is a system used to send parents urgent FCPS updates, when the delay goes over 30 minutes. Still, these tools are rarely advertised, and even though they claim to be automatically set up, a variety of issues can cause notifications to cease.
When students are forced to waste excess minutes waiting for the school bus, they have no other choice but to find another method of transportation to get to school on time. A new bus is no help if it arrives after the school day has already begun.
This has been an ongoing issue for multiple years. Naturally, that calls into question how much work the Office of Transportation Services (OTS) has done to rectify the problem.
“The OTS has received complaints and takes these concerns seriously,” the previously mentioned FCPS spokesperson said. “The OTS is analyzing route data, reviewing student load counts, and gathering feedback from drivers and parents to find the root cause of the problem.”
This statement implies that the complaints have only started coming in recently, which does not line up with students’ experiences.
“I’ve sent emails to the transportation people but I haven’t heard anything back.” Anderson said.
However, this is not to say that the bus drivers are free of struggles. For a while now, there has been a shortage of bus drivers, and drivers have to go to other schools before McLean, which could further any delays that come up.
Having that in mind, it still shouldn’t justify the delays students experience. If FCPS is serious about fixing these issues, it must improve communication with families by making delay notifications more accessible and reliable. Students should not have to dig through an unadvertised website or wait for an unreliable email to know if their bus is coming. Until then, McLean students will be left waiting for a system that won’t come short.
