LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Jefferson County Public Schools parents had a chance to voice their concerns and ask questions about changing start times again for Louisville's public school system.

As parents are facing more changes and decisions, the district hosted a virtual information session Tuesday evening about two proposals that would implement three different start times instead of the nine JCPS currently has.

Many families have expressed their frustrations with the district's transportation problems since the first day of school last August, when some students didn't get home until almost 10 p.m. It was the first day with nine start times across the district, and the first day with consolidated bus routes to deal with driver shortages.

The district canceled school for a week after that to improve logistics. But the problems have persisted.

In an effort to make changes ahead of the 2024-25 school year, the Jefferson County Board of Education voted earlier this month to cut transportation to all magnet and traditional schools, with the exception of Central and Western high schools — which both have a 75% threshold of students on free or reduced lunch.

Cuts to transportation at those schools impacts more than 14,000 students, and leaves parents with a difficult decision — keep their child in a magnet or traditional school without transportation, or transfer them to their resides school. Resides schools are the schools that serve a certain home address, and isn't always the closest school to that address. 

Another effort to reduce transportation issues plaguing Kentucky's largest school district is to consolidate start times, a recommendation given to the district by Prismatic Solutions following its audit of JCPS' transportation mess.

During Tuesday's forum, Superintendent Dr. Marty Pollio said about 10 years ago, the district had 1,050 bus drivers for the district's 900 bus routes to transport JCPS students to the schools of their choice. 

"Over the course of about 10 to 12 years, like almost every other district in the United States, we began to lose bus drivers at an alarming rate," said Pollio.  

Currently, the JCPS has 550 bus drivers for 560 bus routes with no change in the services provided, Pollio said, adding that each school day starts with about 64 more routes than the district has drivers. On top of that, JCPS averages 52 drivers absent daily.

"What this means for our students and families is that we have overcrowded buses and massive delays for students getting to school and home from school, there is just no other way around that," Pollio said.

Pollio said the district is still "working tirelessly" to recruit more bus drivers, which he said is necessary to ensure students aren't missing out on instructional minutes.

"We currently pay our bus drivers at a much greater rate than any district. We're gonna continue to fight to add more bus drivers, but we must also know that getting students to school on time and home in a timely fashion is paramount to me," said Pollio. "We cannot have our kids continue to miss instructional minutes."

JCPS said the average pay for bus drivers is $55,000 a year with base pay starting at $22.78 an hour, but drivers can earn up to $38.78 an hour with incentives for perfect attendance and driving challenging routes.  

As bus driver shortages persist nationwide, Pollio said he's concerned for the future if the trend continues.

"I want to say this, I am truly concerned, not just about next year, but the future of school bus transportation in our public school system for the years to come," he said. "If we look at the trend and the projections of what's gonna happen if we continue, and this is every district across America, continues to lose bus drivers every single year. We have gone from 1,050 to 550. If that trend continues, I am significantly concerned with what will happen in this community five to 10 years from now."

Rob Fulk, JCPS' Chief Operations officer, presented the proposed start times during Tuesday's information session, and reiterated what the district said Monday, that the school board's transportation plan "is not designed to have all students at school on time. There will still be delays."

Fulk said start times during the 2023-24 school year did not put schools into geographic regions according to bus compounds, mirror routes, or use depots for A5 schools/Central and Western, as now approved.

In addition to condensing start times to three instead of nine, the district's directives when making adjustments include addressing "pain points" identified this school year and assuring students with disabilities or experiencing homelessness have transportation to magnet and traditional schools. Fulk said magnet and traditional schools losing transportation have flexibility for start times. 

Pollio also touched on the need for three start times over two start times, and said that while having multiple start times makes it "more difficult and challenging," having two start times would amount to about 750 routes with only 550 drivers.

"Every single day we would start the day short 200 drivers, if we had two start times," he said. "This means that we would cancel or delay 200 routes every single day of the school year, so we've had to make some really tough decisions."

Tyler Shearon, executive administrator for operations, said one of the most commonly asked questions is why three start times are needed, and reiterated Pollio's statement about the need for three start times.

"So if we went back to two start times for next school year, with the approved transportation plan from the board, we would require over 650 bus drivers. This would put us underwater, or without about 175 buses on a daily basis," Shearon said. "We have to have the three start times in order to cover the number of routes we've committed to have for our students across the district."

Additionally, Shearon said the average route time for resides schools is about 45 minutes, and for schools with depot transportation it's closer to an hour.

He also spoke about why times can't be moved up even earlier. Right now, Shearon said bus drivers start their day on the bus around 5:30 a.m., on average, to do prep work. 

"Any movement of the first start time would make them have to get to work around 5:00 in the morning and we are concerned about bus driver retention," he said.

The proposed start times are 7:30 a.m., 8:40 a.m. and 9:40 a.m. Shearon said these times will allow for more than an hour to operate the district's depot, an hour to operate direct runs, and allows the district to be more on time given bus depots and distance.

"We try and keep our routes at around that 45-50-minute range," he said. 

The district is considering two proposals to changing start times.

Marcus Dobbs, executive administrator for transportation, discussed the first scenario, which would shift times for about 40 schools. The benefits, he said, include less disruption, no middle schools starting at 9:40 a.m., and would address "pain points" such as traffic patterns at multiple schools. 

Download PDF JCPS Start Times Scenario 1.pdf

Some of the limitations of the first scenario, Dobbs said, include the fact that it's not geographically-based, meaning seven of the district's 13 bus compounds will be in geographic regions. There is less mirroring, 20%-30%, which makes it more inefficient, and a later clear time. 

Mirroring, Dobbs said, means having the same groups of kids on the morning and afternoon routes, he said.

To look at the first scenario, click here or see the PDF embedded in this story.

The second scenario, Dobbs said, would shift times for about 80 schools. Benefits include all compounds being in their geographic regions, a low route count, higher mirroring, 50%-60%, and an earlier clear time.

Limitations, however, include three middle schools starting at 9:40 a.m. and a higher number of schools changing start times. 

To look at the second scenario, click here or see the PDF embedded in this story.

Download PDF JCPS Start Times Scenario 2.pdf

The district also shared a video showing the impact the current transportation plan is having on students at Ramsey Middle School, where more than 100 students are about 20 minutes late almost daily because of bus delays. 

Some students at Ramsey, who are on a bus that is chronically late, said not getting to school on time keeps them from spending free time in the mornings with friends, sets them back because they show up later than everyone else and don't have time to catch up.

In the video, Jordan Paskitti, with Ramsey, said the middle school has been "greatly" impacted by the transportation issues, with two to three buses showing up late every day. Paskitti said school calculations estimated 200,000 instructional minutes have been lost at the school because of the problems.

One student said coming in late and not having the chance to catch up puts him behind and effects his grades. From the teachers' point of view, they said it's also having an impact on their ability to teach.

"When you're halfway through a lesson, and the students need to come in late, and then you have to go back and basically reteach the first half of the lesson again, it can be stressful," Ramsey Middle School teacher Deanna Glesser said in the video.

Paskitti said the situation is even worse at dismissal in the afternoons. Of the school's 16 buses, 12 are late every day and are "not consistent."

"With families trying to make appointments, sports schedules, anything after school, it's never consistent on which ones are late or when," he said, adding that anything the district could do to ensure students arrive to school on time would be a "gamechanger." 

District spokesperson Carolyn Callahan said the situation at Ramsey demonstrates why the adjustments are necessary, before going into the Q&A portion of Tuesday's forum.

The first question addressed came from the Jefferson County Teacher's Association, the union representing JCPS teachers. 

JCTA asked the district to "outline the guiding principals that were used to develop these options."

Pollio said the district started by looking at the amount of bus drivers it has, and then looking at "what is going to get our kids to school on time?" The district is anticipating about 525 bus drivers for the 2024-25 school year, with about 50 absent every day, leaving about 475 bus drivers to work with every day. 

"That's a limitation in the number of drivers we have. We can only do what we can with the resources that we have," he said. 

With a change in start times, parents said they're frustrated, and worry they'll have to make more tough decisions yet again when the board puts the changes up to a vote.

"The middle school it's always late. Getting at least half an hour late to school," one concerned parent, with two children in JCPS, said. One of their children is consistently 30 minutes late to school because of the bus.

"It is very concerning, because he's losing instructional minutes in the early part of his day and it ruins his mood and it's very frustrating for me as well," he said, adding that while he prefers the second scenario being proposed, he understands many families are worried their lives are going to change yet again.

"We would need to make some tough decisions based on the outcome," he said.

Some teachers, who didn't want to speak on-camera, said they wish board members would talk to them about their concerns and what the best option would be. 

Callahan said any questions not answered will be put on an FAQ page on the district's website sometime on Wednesday. The feedback form will also remain open for a few more days for families to be able to submit more questions and comments. The form can be accessed by clicking here.

The school board is expected to make a decision on start times during its May board meeting, scheduled for next Tuesday, May 7.

Tuesday's meeting was streamed live on the district's YouTube page. You can watch it in the player below:

We want to hear from you about your thoughts regarding JCPS' transportation plan. To share your story, click here.

JCPS Transportation Coverage:

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