Artkansas 

When your boss's boss okays hunting for alternate means of support while you are at your desk at work.

Retro Grouch 

One of the nice things about driving a school bus is it's a job that can't be out sourced offshore.

TruF 

In my case it was when my boss's boss's boss's secretary made a one-on-one appointment on his behalf to speak with me. And my boss had no idea what it was about.

speedlever

In my case, it was when our health insurance was terminated for lack of payment and took a month to get re-instated.

Then expenses began taking longer to be paid.

Then paychecks started to be late.

And then...

Beverly

That's true but in today's economy a few school districts have cut some of their bus service and made the parents responsible for getting the kids to school, made the students walk or quit busing them across town and let them attend neighborhood schools.

Retro Grouch 

There's truth in your rain-on-my-parade post of course, but there's more to it than that.

There are legal distance requirements regarding when bus service has to be provided. In our suburban district a lot of kids live within a mile or 2 from school but I've also bussed students who live more than 15 miles from the nearest school.

One of the most hazardous places to walk or ride a bike is the area immediately surrounding the school buildings. There are serious traffic accidents almost every day at dismissal time in the areas within 1 mile of our three high schools.

In out district most of the cross district bussing is to consolidate special education programs like for the hearing impaired and English as a second language. We don't have enough students to justify having those programs in every school. In some other cases we do bus kids a significant distance because it's necessary to match the student population with building capacities.

The bottom line is they'd have to eliminate about 40% of the bussing in our district before it would impact me. Every one of those jobs has to be filled by a local, certified driver. There aren't very many jobs that provide that kind of job security.

Beverly

I didn't mean to rain on your parade I agree your job is probably one of the safest and can't be outsourced.

Ohio law says students in K-8 must be bused if they live more than 2 miles from their school. It's not a requirement for grades 9-12 and districts have cut this service during tough times.

One local school district has no bus service. K-8 kids attend neighborhood schools within the two mile limit but they have only one high school. High school students walk or ride the RTA system.

megaman

When the time clock doesn't accept your card.

ken cummings

When your supervisor tells you, in the middle of the day, to call the temp agency that sent you there.

Yen

When funding forced them to cut my weekly hours to <20.........

EDIT: Er... make that reduced funding.

jppe

When your VP says "have you ever thought about working over in __________ division" and that division is being sold..........

bcoppola

Not yet. But wait till the same technology that enables a "pilot" in a trailer outside Las Vegas to remotely fly a Predator drone over Afghanistan trickles down. Your kid's bus will be "driven" by Vijay in Bangalore!



(OK, that's farfetched...)

n4zou

You obviously have not heard of distant education or distant learning.
Alabama is well on the way to full implementation of distant education. Eventually this will eliminate brick and mortar schools. Students will learn at home via a high speed internet connection and only show up to take required tests at a few locations around the state. Granted; this will not happen state wide for several years but non the less it's on the way.
Yes; I know your thinking "This guy's full of BS"! Just click this link and have a look yourself.
https://accessdl.state.al.us/showacce...nk=aboutaccess
The plan is to start with Advanced Placement, elective, and other courses not available in all schools. As the program is implemented ever more students are enrolled removing them from the brick and mortar class room. As union teachers retire or move to other en devours there not replaced. Reducing numbers of students attending brick and mortar buildings causes these schools to consolidate into fewer schools closing all small neighborhood schools in the process. Unionized teachers dwindle in number and power so eventually there will be only a few education centers remaining where students only show up for testing once or twice a month.

Retro Grouch 

So how's it working? I just pulled up a report from somebody that ranked Alabama 45th in education results. At 65 I'm not going to worry just yet.

Retro Grouch 

Vijay may be able to operate the bus but that's the easy part. Who's going to keep the kids from killing one another?

rideon7

Our district this year implemented online "credit retrieval" classes for students who weren't going to graduate (lack of credits) and would probably drop out otherwise. I talked with two students who made up one and a half year's worth of classes in four months. One passed her classes with 60.0% (bare minimum). Not surprising that every kid who's failing now wants to do these online classes. They don't even have to go to school (tests are also done online). These students will get their diplomas next month and will soon be applying to a workplace near you!

Retro Grouch 

Where you see as a problem, I see opportunity!

I'm thinking that when I lose my school bussing job I'll start a new career as a "ringer" taking those online tests. Do you suppose they might let me schedule doing that between morning and afternoon routes?

rideon7

Yes, indeed. It's all about the student's success! Two things that are anathema to the American adolescent: boredom and inconvenience. How can we help each and every one?

Artkansas 

When the company is late on payroll... twice.

wrk101

When your company gets sold, and the new buyer says they want to keep all of the talent, yadda, yadda. Then, within the first week, one of your peers is gone, within one year, you are the only one left. Then get moved to another division, and they finish flushing any remaining people from the original firm.

Avoid debt, save for a rainy day, and be prepared. Then it really is no big deal.

MNBikeguy

Man....whatever you're making......it ain't enough.
Thanks for keeping the kids safe, all the while putting up with the little snot nosed smart alecs...

Artkansas 

And then after that they just don't bother with payroll three times, cut off the cell phone and then the land lines go dead. I'm just waiting for the cable, internet to go and the landlord to lock us out.

Things are so goofed up, that I'm not really sure who is employing me. I'm looking around the office to see what things I may need to confiscate if I don't get paid.

The only reason not to quit is that you are more hireable when you are employed. I've got all my tasks done now, so I'm spending a lot of time getting the resumes and portfolios working and looking for ways to practice interviewing.

A resume

A demo


But, keeping a bicycle theme here, if I leave, my commute may shrink to zero. Should I make a fake commute for myself so I get some exercise?

Rowan

So why are you still there if you aren't being paid and services are being cut off? One week is bad enough, two weeks and I'd be out of there, three weeks and I'd be just stupid even bothering to grace the front doorstep.

ad6mj

True, but it can be contracted to the lowest bidder.

Retro Grouch 

It's still a relatively secure job. The school district that I drive for has roughly 185 drivers. We're Teamsters. If a new contractor doesn't want to ratify our contract, they'd have to find 185 certified drivers in a relatively short period of time. That's a pretty tall order. It takes roughly a month to get a new driver certified and a lot of newby's don't last very long. We've always got the "Now Hireing" sign out. I've only been driving for 5 1/2 years. During that short amount of time I've already seen the name on the side of the bus change twice. That's about the only thing that's changed.

A more likely scenerio would be reducing the number of bus routes that the district runs to the minimum that's mandated by the state. I'm pretty sure that's going to be in the works but not for the upcoming school year. They'd have to cut out roughly 40% of the routes to impact me. I doubt they can do that in our district.