Page opened the first commercial driver's license school in the Chicago area in 1990 and works with his prospective drivers on job and career-readiness skills. The Trans Group, headquartered in Chestnut Ridge, N.Y., and serving dozens of suburban school districts, has acquired a reputation for innovative recruiting and retention tactics. Many of the districts the company serves have an array of extracurricular programs, which allows some drivers to work eight hours a day. Current drivers who recruit new ones receive a bonus plus a ticket that goes into a company-wide drawing for a new car. However, some proposals that look attractive come with hidden costs that far outweigh any potential savings.
School buses are the safest form of ground transportation.
If school busing is reduced or eliminated, more parents will drive their children to school, and more children will walk or ride their bikes to school. Worst of all, more high school students will drive to school. Statistics show that far more students are killed in automobiles, on bicycles, or walking than riding school buses. Having students ride city transit buses rather than school buses is another false economy. Using smaller vehicles is also a false economy.