Wheels in motion for more public school buses
Posted Feb 23, 2010 04:17:56 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The region’s public school board has given final approval to a plan that will see thousands more students bused to school.
The board plans to add 40 buses to transport 7,500 students who currently walk to school.
Superintendent Marilyn Marklevitz says a provincial review found that public school students were walking further to school than both the provincial average, and their peers in the Catholic Board.
The plan will see walking distances shortened to 0.8 kilometres for junior and senior kindergarten students and 1.6 kilometres for students in grades one through eight.
Adding those buses will come with a 2.9 million dollar price tag but Marklevitz is optimistic that the board will be reimbursed at least 90 percent.
Marklevitz admits that a small number of students who currently get Courtesy Bus Transportation will no longer be bused to school, but she says those students were not entitled to a bus to begin with.
