I’m sure you all remember taking the school bus as a kid. I’m certain you have some decent memories about your bus, we all do. For the most part, I bet you have horrible memories of your bus, just like me. This year, you put your re-districting plan into action. Well, sort of. You decided that you were going to grandfather everyone who had already started at a middle school. I think that this was a terrible mistake. This decision directly impacted me. You now have to pay for extra buses because of grandfathering…. so you combined my bus with another bus. You have combined two neighborhoods that are not even close to each other! Now my bus is extremely crowded and uncomfortable, late, and has a route that makes no sense whatsoever.
Almost everyone in my entire bus has to triple seat. This is very unsafe. In fact, I’m not even sure this is legal! Since the bus is so crowded it becomes very stuffy, hot, and smelly! This could be a huge health concern. For example, I have asthma and the bus is very stuffy. This leaves me gasping for breath! I do not even have severe asthma; imagine what it would be like for someone that did! This is one reason the town should supply my neighborhood with two buses. At the end of the day, we kids are generally tired, hungry, annoyed, upset, stressed, etc. The last thing we want to do is sit on that crowded, smelly, stinky bus for 45 minutes! In fact, most of us just want to go home and rest! Since the bus is so crowded, it becomes much louder than normal. The loudness gives me a headache, and just makes me really annoyed and irritated! In a recent survey, 95% percent of bus drivers found it hard to control the noise level on their busses. This is most likely because the bus is so crowded. On my bus the driver, Maria, always has to yell to calm us down. This greatly increases the noise level. It is the bus driver’s job to calm us down, and right now, this isn’t happening. Speaking of jobs… my bus is always late!
It is the bus driver’s responsibility to get us kids where we need to go ON TIME, no excuses. I always arrive at school late because of the bus. This is not okay! I am missing homeroom and valuable independent reading time! This could and will directly influence my grades. Reading is the base of every subject in school and if I am not a good reader, I’m basically doomed. Reading also expands your vocabulary, spelling, grammar, etc. and right now I need a lot of help with these things. This is why it is crucial for me to be on time for school. Maybe if the bus didn’t have to pick up two completely different neighborhoods I wouldn’t be late for school every day! Not only that, but my bus is always late picking us up from school. This is inexcusable. You should be stricter on what time the buses need to be at school to get us. School gets out at 2:50 and usually the bus doesn’t arrive at school until 3:05! Last year, I would get home at 3:05. This year, on a good day, I get home at 3:35! This isn’t fair at all! When I get home from school, I have to juggle sports, homework, friends, family, and more. It’s a lot for a kid to take on, now that I am getting home so late, I have much less time to do so. It makes me very stressed, which is not healthy for a teenager. 14/15 of my friends here at ……. say that their bus gets home after 3:30. This is ridiculous! Routes and buses should be changed!
Like I said before, the bus picks up two neighborhoods. After the bus picks up us, it goes past my neighborhood and heads towards the other neighborhood. It drops them off, then stops a half mile out of the way at to turn around. In my opinion, the bus route should be changed! They should drop my neighborhood off first, since it is much closer to the school than the other neighborhood. Then, they should proceed to drop off the next neighborhood. This would be much more sensible since we wouldn’t have to turn around at a church that is out of the way. Perhaps, we might even get home at a reasonable time if the route was changed. Also, if the bus dropped us off before the other neighborhood, it would be saving a lot of fuel because the bus would not have to backtrack. Saving fuel helps the environment because less pollution from bus emissions are sent into the air. Also, not wasting as much fuel saves the town lots of money since fuel is so expensive these days. So, putting all this into factor… why wouldn’t you change the route?
Overall, I believe that for the better of the schools, the town should supply us kids with better busses. Busses that value the health concerns and volume levels on the bus would be ideal. I think that the town should look at the busses that are transporting us to school more carefully, and put forth a reasonable plan for the good of the students. Think about when you were a kid, you would want a better bus too.