When life pushes you to the edge of the cliff don’t be so discouraged. There are only two things can happen, either God will catch you when you fall or He will teach you how to fly! I know this because He taught me how to drive a school bus! 😃😃😃
One hot afternoon last summer, my wife and I were driving back home from our regular groceries shopping when we saw a school bus parked on the big parking lot next to the groceries store. There was a small white tent, a desk and some people manning the desk. There was a big sign saying “WE ARE HIRING SCHOOL BUS DRIVERS $17.10 / hr PAID TRAINING plus $1,500.00 SIGN UP BONUS.” My wife asked if I want to try that job just to keep me busy. I wasn’t working at that time but driving that gigantic machine as a job never crossed my mind. Out of curiosity we stopped at the booth and talk to the lady at the desk. She gave me a form to fill out and scheduled an interview the following day. The next day, it didn’t take long before they had me scheduled for my first-day training.
It was a two-week straightforward but meticulous video training on rules, regulations and safety procedures for driving a school bus. At the same time, I had to get a CDL (commercial driver license) permit from DMV before they put me on BTW (behind the wheel) or driving the real bus training. It took another week totaling 18 hours of driving. Then the big day came: pre-trip inspection test followed by drive test. I passed both tests 100%, and in no time they gave me my real CDL with school bus endorsement, one bus to drive, and one route schedule to do the next day on my own!
The School Bus
A school bus is the most powerful vehicle on the planet. It is a protected vehicle just like an endangered species is protected. When I stick out the STOP sign and the red lights flashing for kids pick up and drop off traffic freezes. Nothing moves! Not even an ambulance with its blaring siren and flashing strobe lights can beat my school bus! The school bus is the King. You beat the King, your jail is waiting! 😀
Many would think that driving a school bus is hard. It is not. It is just like driving your own car. The bus is big and heavy, 40 feet long and weigh 33.000 pounds, but you won’t feel it. Everything is powered. Steering and braking are easy because they are powered. The engine is so powerful that pulling a busload of students – my bus can accommodate 77 students – is a piece of cake. The only major difference is when you make a turn, especially right turn. Because of its length the rear wheels do not follow the front wheels, we call it off-tracking. So turning needs a wider radius. Turning left is OK because you are already in the wider lane, but turning right sometimes we need to take up the other lane not belong to us. Other motorists usually understand this issue and give us way. But sometimes I have to push the other motorists to back up so I can turn. Basically, school buses don’t follow the lane lines. With precious load inside it is the king!
The Route
They call my route Route #9, serving one high school, one middle school, and one elementary school in turns. The route schedule details everything: the street to follow, the stop number, and the time at each stop. The students are supposed to be at their bus stop 5 minutes before the schedule, and the bus is not supposed to arrive before the scheduled time. Each school has a different start time, for me, the first leg is the high school. It has 4 stops with 25 students. After drop them off at their school comes the elementary school and kindergarten leg that has 13 stops with 60 students. Drop them at school and the middle school leg is last with 10 stops of 25 students. Total distance for the route is only 20 miles but it takes 2.5 to 3 hours to complete depends on traffic. I do the same thing in the afternoon in reverse, from school to home. The first couple of days were terrible. I missed some stops, made wrong turns, running too early when there were no students yet at the stops. So stressful! But doing it twice a day, every day, quickly changed everything. Now it becomes my second nature!
The Kids
Driving a school bus is transporting the most precious cargo in the world: kids so safety is premium. The students have been briefed on the safety issues, what to do and what not. As the bus driver, I interact with three groups of students every day. High school students are easy to handle, they are old enough to know the difference between good and bad attitudes and consequences of anything they do. They are young adults with responsibility, you tell them something once and they respond properly. Elementary school students and kindergarteners are really wild but they follow instructions easily. My only problem with them is they want attention and keep talking to me while I am driving. Middle school students are unpredictable. They are kids want to be adults but don’t know how. Each age group needs to be handled differently. If things went a little wild and it affected safety I would stop the bus, secured it in a safe place, faced them and talked to them through the PA system. The bus is equipped with security cameras, three of them, so I would just let them know that everything they do or say on the bus is recorded for safety purposes. And the record is available to their school any time. It’s a good deterrent!
The Job
School bus driving is a part-time job, with a guaranteed 5 hrs minimum a day. But you can easily build it into a full time of 8 hours or more a day if you take school trips and school activities. My regular route is 6 to 9 am for
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