Shortages of bus drivers are being experienced across the state of Alaska as school began recently. The shortages led to consolidated bus routes not only because of a shortage of staffers to drive the kids to school, but also because of the prices to fuel up the school buses.
KPBSD Superintendent Clayton Holland tells KSRM that First Student, formerly known as Apple Bus Company, is looking to hire school bus drivers:
“So, we are advertising it, there’s a bonus for bus drivers right now to come in. They will train you to get a CDL. If you have a CDL, I believe the bonus is $2,500, $1,500 if you don’t, but they will train you up on that. Right now, we are looking good. We’ve had a number of people apply. Our big concern is, if there’s a sickness going through our drivers, can we cover those and what are our contingencies with that. We have been working on that as well. We actually had that in one location today where we just try to consolidate a route. We had some longer time getting to school, but our commitment is to do all we can to not leave a route unserved on a day. We don’t want to be in that same position as an Anchorage or Mat-Su.”
Holland gives an overview of the needs of the KPBSD:
“We filled this gap at the beginning of the year with First Student drivers from the State of Washington before school started down there. They’ve done that. We’ve had six people trained or getting trained right at the moment. We had another one transfer down from the Interior. My understanding is we have a lot of people in the shop for First Student bus who are able to drive as well. So, we have enough to cover our routes, but we’re a little concerned about that sickness piece.”
Holland speaks on when finding bus drivers became an issue:
“You know, what we found last year is we were able to keep our routes running. I know places like Fairbanks last year that actually went half the routes got served one week and half the next. So I think there were signs of this happening across the state last year and this year, but I think the extent for a lot of places kind of caught me off guard. I knew we were going to be tight, but I’d say just like all of the labor markets around the U.S., this is one more area where it’s difficult to find people.”
