ELLICOTT CITY, Md. — It was a day where it seemed like everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. The first day of school in Howard County last year was marked by chaos - 20 new bus drivers never showed up to work. Bus routes were canceled for 2,400 students for the entire week. New school start times complicated matters even more.
"And at the same time, we onboarded a new contractor that had almost half of our routes. That onboarding had not been complete," recalled Jahantab Siddiqui, who was the chief administrative officer for Howard County Public Schools (HCPS) last year. He's now the director of student transportation.
"So all of those variables sort of created a perfect storm that lasted through September until we provided a little more space in our schedule and as our contractor staffed up," Superintendent William Barnes said.
But some challenges persisted throughout the rest of the school year.
"Growing pains that would normally be absorbed and be a non-story but they're significant on the heels of a bad start like we had last year," Barnes told WMAR-2 News' Elizabeth Worthington.
A lot of the blame fell on Zum Transportation, the new out-of-state contractor hired last year to take over more than half of Howard County's bus routes. But bussing challenges have existed in Howard County for years and predate the new contractor, a point Zum was quick to call outlast year.
"We've incorporated their feedback. One of the major things that they shared with us was - please don't make changes at the last minute," Siddiqui said.
Last year, Siddiqui says, the school district didn't "stress test" the new start times to make sure they'd work, and bus routes were changed just days before the first day of school, not giving drivers enough time to do dry runs. This year, those routes were given to drivers at the beginning of August.
And Zum has assured school leaders they have plenty of staff, all of whom are Maryland residents. Last year, desperate for drivers, Zum brought in 70 drivers from out of state.
"Cautiously optimistic is the phrase I used with the team. The data they've given me gives me confidence. Having come off a crisis like we had last year, I want to see it before I fully believe it," Barnes said. "But I feel really good about our staffing data. I feel great about the way our team has performed - our district transportation team. So I feel good about our first day."
On the school district side, new leaders at the helm hopefully mark a new beginning.
Siddiqui assumed the role of director of student transportation in July. And Barnes became superintendent in January. Both were promoted from previous leadership roles in the school system.
Over the last several months, Siddiqui says: "We worked on rebuilding our relationships with local contractors that had soured over the years."
He said there's a surplus of drivers available this year.
"So we know we’ve got the staffing in place, we’ve got the equipment in place, but transportation can be the kind of operation where a minor accident can cause a lot of challenges. So just be patient," he asks parents.
The school board voted to make another big change -- reversing last year's decision to cut bus service for some 3,000 students,based on how far they live from the school. Some kids as young as five had to walk a mile to school. Some high schoolers had to walk two miles.
Afterstudents were robbed at gunpoint just minutes from their school in Ellicott City, parents were concerned.
"I want to make sure my son can come home safely," Jennifer Duan, mother of a 7th grader, told WMAR-2 News last year. "Unfortunately, I don't work from home - neither does my husband - so we don't have the option of taking him home every day."
"It can be an issue," Barnes said. "We’ve always had student walkers, I think 16 or 17,000 of our kids will continue to walk, a few thousand less next year. So we work with families to understand what that means. We monitor attendance rates on bad weather days and continue to work with families neighborhood by neighborhood to address concerns where it might not be appropriate for students to walk."
Bus service will be restored for the approximately 3,000 students who lost it last year, but not until next fall.
"We decided to wait until next fall to kind of reduce the walk zone distances because at the time the decision was made, we hadn’t yet had the confidence that we would have enough drivers or buses or the funding to support a reduction [of distance] for this fall," Barnes told WMAR-2 News. "The turnaround time, the re-routing would have been too tight."
“As soon as we get this school year underway, we are going to be working on re-drawing those zones and issuing a request for proposals for the additional buses that we will need. We will need about 11 buses to implement that decision," Siddiqui said.
But for this year, "It’ll be a continuation of the same walking distances as last year and if there are safety issues, we will address each safety issue. If there are parents who would like to file an appeal, there is a walking appeal committee."
HCPS also conducted an audit, both internally and externally, of its transportation system, and plans to address each of the recommendations made.
"I know we’ve worked hard internally to make sure that we’ve analyzed all of our practices and processes to make sure that our part in the transportation crisis, our responsibility, those issues have been addressed," Barnes said.
The 2024-2025 school year will be the second of a three-year contract between Zum and HCPS. Barnes says if the contract is not renewed, the school system will have to search for a replacement contractor to cover more than half of the county's bus routes, so he's motivated to make the relationship work.
In a statement to WMAR-2 News, a Zum spokesperson said:
"We are excited for the start of a great school year in Howard County. We are aligned with Superintendent Barnes' student transportation priorities [news.hcpss.org] for the 2024-2025 school year, and have been working closely with the Howard County Public School System team to ensure those priorities are met."
