Buses may be half empty, due to concerns about social distancing during the Covid-19 pandemic. Drivers may be required to take students’ temperatures before allowing them to board. Students may be in assigned seats. Drivers may be separated from students with Plexiglas.
CNN Business spoke to several drivers about their concerns for next year:
Carleth Hnatiuk from Bloomfield, Connecticut:
The children want to speak to us as the bus driver. How are you? How was your weekend? What are we going to do, tell them not to stand in front of us? We may need plexiglass from drivers, like in supermarkets where ATMs are.
I drive a big bus with 50 children. There’s no way I think they should put 50 kids on a bus. They must leave all other seats empty to help with social distancing.
Children don’t know how to stay away from each other. They always hug, talk.
Until the coronavirus is extinct, they must provide support to drivers – a monitor that can ensure that children wear masks and are seated properly. Drivers cannot look back every five seconds. Those are big buses and you have to keep your eyes on the road. It is safety first.
For drivers, at this time we don’t know what the future holds. We are out there in limbo.
Phyllis Pepper from South Holland, Illinois:
I’m ready to go back, but I don’t know if the system is ready for us to go back. They probably have a paper plan, but everything on paper doesn’t work. We need to do a test run.
They are all a little suspicious. We are afraid for ourselves. What is going to happen?
I have heard that the district will not take student temperatures. They must be brought before the children get on the bus, so that students and employees do not get sick. If someone is ill, that means the entire school may need to close.
I work with children with special needs. I don’t know if the masks will remain on a child’s face. Is the child removing the mask? We cannot lay our hands on a child. That is against the law. If we are trying to put the mask back on the child, yes, that could be a problem.
Darleen Swanson of Orange County, California:
I miss being with other employees and children. We couldn’t say goodbye to our children last year. We couldn’t see our elders leave. I am looking forward to going back and seeing how all of this will unfold.
Make them sit in any other seat with a child in a seat, I’m not sure how they are going to do that. It will be a trial and error. I have some children who like to sit three times in a row, and two others in a row. How are we going to do that?
Children help each other with homework. You can’t remove that from them. This takes away the learning aspect of some of them. Perhaps that is the last person they see before going home on the weekend, and the child will be isolated.
My fear is getting the virus and taking it home with my family and something deadly that happens to my family. I spend a lot of time with my uncle who is over 65 years old. I spend time with my dad who is 76 years old.
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