Unit 5 is working to solve transportation hurdles that lead to some students getting to school late.
Two high school teachers spoke Wednesday during the school board’s monthly meeting to ask the school district to address the issue. The school district already had plans to implement changes on Thursday.
Ricky King, a Normal West teacher, said about half of his 24 students in his first-hour history class consistently arrive to class up to 15 minutes late. He said it has been a recurring issue for six years.
“Every single year, these students come into the school hungry, frustrated, and angry, having not had time to socialize with their peers, time to eat breakfast, and time to use the bathroom,” said King. “These students are being turned off from school — by not getting them here on time, they're learning not to love school.”
Jessica Salmonson teaches French at both Unit 5 high schools, Normal Community and West. She said unreliable bus arrivals disproportionately affect lower-income students in Unit 5 because they're less likely to have an alternative way to get to school.
“These students begin their day behind their peers, potentially missing valuable instructional time before they have even entered the classroom,” said Salmonson. “They may miss lessons, directions, announcements and opportunities to participate, and they have no control over it.”
Joseph Adelman, Unit 5 executive director of operations, said the issue already was on the district’s radar. Unit 5 began dropping some bus stops and rearranging buses on Thursday.
“I think we have a solution. I'm hoping that'll show,” said Adelman.
But more extreme measures, like changing start times at the high school level, are not on the table.
“Worst case is, add another bus or another route, but we need to make sure that we exhaust everything,” said Adelman.
Doing so would cost money. Transportation remains the largest issue in terms of balancing the budget every year for Unit 5. The same is true for school districts across Illinois.
All are required to provide transportation with the promise of reimbursement by the state, but the gap between school district spending and what comes back remains wide across the state.
Unit 5 Superintendent Kristen Weikle said a number of issues throughout the morning bus route can throw a schedule off. Unforeseen traffic accidents and road construction are some examples.
Unit 5 has transportation tiers. The elementary tier is the time of the morning when the most buses are out; they start with this tier because elementary schools start first.
“Then, after the elementary tier, some of those buses are going to pick up high school students and transport our high school students to high school,” said Weikle.
Natural gas savings
Also Wednesday, the school board approved a number of other items on the agenda, including a 12-month agreement with NRG Energy to lock in a natural gas price at $.36 per therm.
Based on rates for the previous year, the rate would save the school district about $60,000 if it uses the same amount of natural gas.
