Bus delays biggest issue for elementary changes

PINE PLAINS — The reconfiguration of elementary schools in the Pine Plains Central School District has finally happened, and so far the only hiccups have been bus delays.

Sept. 8 marked the first day of school as well as the first day testing out the district’s new elementary system, in which children were assigned to school not based on where they live but according to their grade. To reflect these changes, there are slight title adjustments. Formerly Cold Spring Elementary and Seymour Smith Elementary, the buildings are now called the Cold Spring Early Learning Center, which houses kindergarten through grade two, and the Seymour Smith Intermediate Learning Center, for grades three to five.

The actual first day of school for students attending Seymour Smith in Pine Plains and Cold Spring in Stanfordville went smoothly, reported building principals Richard Azoff and Jay Glynn, respectively, at the district’s Sept. 8 Board of Education meeting.

But the principals mentioned bus delays, an issue that district Superintendent Linda Kaumeyer addressed late in the meeting.

The degree of delay ranged from five to 10 minutes to 20 to 30 minutes, she reported, the result of an accumulation of many small delays, some of which could be attributed to the new busing schedule and some of which were simply issues that commonly arise on the first day of school.

Kaumeyer actually participated in one of the bus runs that morning and provided the board with a list of common themes that arose throughout the stops and contributed to the delays.

•Families having moved without notifying the district

•Students being picked up by another bus

•Students deciding to drive to school rather than take the bus

•Parents conversing with drivers and stopping to take pictures of their children getting on the bus

•One bus having finished its pickup but getting stuck behind another bus still making stops

•Longer trips and vehicle turnarounds to ensure children weren’t crossing the street to board the bus

Adding to those issues was a last-minute bus driver absence, Kaumeyer said, also pointing out that 10 students registered that very morning who needed bus transportation.

For the trip home, delays in loading students onto buses, mostly due to different procedures within the elementary schools, created afternoon backlogs of roughly a half-hour as well. The last student was dropped off at 5:06 p.m., the superintendent reported.

The school district received more than 100 phone calls regarding the bus schedule, but as of that evening’s meeting almost every issue had been resolved, Kaumeyer said, thanks to the diligent efforts from the district’s bus garage staff.

The majority of these issues will be rectified as the drivers get more accustomed to their new routes, as well as their passengers, Kaumeyer said. But the district will also be working to rectify any situations where students are walking four or five houses down to meet their bus, as well as providing better vehicle identification so parents aren’t confused when a bus passes by their house without stopping to pick up students.

“The goal every day with these new routes is that we want to see fewer and fewer delays,� the superintendent explained. “And we’ll be monitoring the system on a daily basis to make sure that happens.�