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School bus cancellations in Nova Scotia’s Colchester County have left parents scrambling to find alternative transportation for their kids after the holiday break.
Catherine Rushton’s daughters attend Chiganois Elementary in Masstown and Central Colchester Junior High School in Onslow. Both of their bus routes have been without permanent drivers since classes resumed this month and that’s leading to cancellations.
“I am now having to check the bus planner every morning at 6 a.m. to make sure that I have a bus, or if I don’t have a bus, and then how I’m going to plan for that,” Rushton said in an interview.
Rushton said on one occasion it was easier to keep her kids home rather than finding alternative transportation.
“It’s a right for children to be able to get to school, to access education. That’s just a basic right that we should have. If we are paying for busing, we should have busing,” she said.
Two retirements
A letter sent to parents on Wednesday acknowledged two long-term bus drivers retired in December. They supported routes for Chiganois Elementary, Delbert Elementary, Central Colchester Junior High and Cobequid Educational Centre.
“While we work through the hiring process, spare drivers are being used temporarily to fill in for retirements as well as cover sudden sickness or other reasons a permanent driver could be off work,” Chris Zwicker of the Chignecto Central Regional Centre for Education (CCRCE) said in the letter.
“Unfortunately, we do not currently have enough spare drivers to cover all our unfilled driver absences,” he added.
A spokesperson told CBC News the centre for education is attending job fairs and a recruitment campaign is also ongoing.
“In addition, we have been analyzing our onboarding processes to ensure more potential drivers complete the training and are able to join the transportation team,” Jennifer Rodgers, a spokesperson for CCRCE, said in an email.
Tom Taggart, the MLA for Colchester North, admits school bus driver shortages are not a new problem, but he believes there has been progress.
“I don’t want to be critical. I think they’re making significant improvements,” he said.
Taggart said he expects the centre for education to improve communication with parents — something Rushton said is needed particularly for families who live up to an hour away.
“A lot of parents have children in different schools that take different bus routes, some going as far as Five Islands to Truro,” she said.
“Having to figure out a drive to and from school for working parents and rural populations. It’s a real discrepancy [compared to] busing in town.”
Rushton said the retirements were not unexpected departures, and questions what reforms could better recruit bus drivers.
Jenny-Lynn Wardrope, president of CUPE 3890 which represents bus drivers in CCRCE, declined an interview, but said driver shortages are a provincewide problem.
In March, school support staff across Nova Scotia ratified a tentative agreement with the province after raising concerns that included wages and workplace violence.
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