See editorial on 6A.
The Sampson County Board of Education has decided, in a split vote, to waive the requirement for certain school staff to obtain a bus driver’s license, if they have been with the school system for 20 years or more.
That decision was made at the regular monthly school board meeting Monday night. The approved amendment will add new regulations to Policy 7400, which has been discussed at multiple board meetings and seeks to ensure more bus drivers in the school system.
Policy 7400, titled “Job Description,” has been brought up periodically in board meetings over the past few years. The policy states, “job descriptions for teacher assistants, cafeteria workers and custodial staff members will include a requirement that a license to drive a bus be obtained and maintained, and that the employee drive a bus as needed and requested by the principal.” Those who do not comply with the policy would be at risk for termination.
At last month’s meeting, the board made several adjustments to the policy to improve its structure and enforcement. The board modified the policy to allow certain staff such as lead custodians and assistant principals to be exempt from the policy to allow for better school management. In addition, the board also voted to let the policy allow a 90-day period after taking a bus driving class to pass a bus driver test before the school would proceed with termination.
At Monday night’s meeting, the board added further regulations to the policy, this time revolving around a “grandfathering in” process, allowing certain staff members in the system to be exempt from the policy and follow the old rules based on the number of years they have served in a position. In this case, the “old rules” would mean that they would not have to get a bus driver’s liscense and would therefore be exempt from termination. The board was required to choose from what point the exemption would be allowed — 10, 15 0r 20 years.
According to Superintendent Dr. Jamie King, Sampson County Schools currently has 48 staff members in these positions who do not have a license, have an issue getting a license, or have no plans to get their license. Of those 48, five have more than 20 years of service, eight have more than 15 years and 14 have more than 10 years. Board member Jennifer Naylor recommended to put the regulation at 10 years.
“I would just like to say that the goal is to get kids to school. The goal is never to fire people,” said Naylor. “The goal here is to get kids to school and get them to school on time.”
However, this recommendation was not agreed upon by the majority of the board. Board member Kim Schmidlin made a motion to not grandfather in the policy until 20 years of service. This motion was passed by the majority of the board with Board Chair Darryl Warren and Naylor being the only to voice opposition. Naylor also attempted to meet in the middle with Schmidlin’s motion to grandfather in the policy at 15 years. This was also not agreed upon.
In addition to this, the board also voted to allow 12 weeks of medical leave for people who already have their license and later become incapacitated due to something unforeseen and become unable to drive.
“This is only for people who have their license when something happens to them and they become incapacitated,” said Board Member Sonya Powell.
Policy 7400 was approved in late 2024 and stated that the changes would be made to the job description policy by Jan. 1, 2025. However, the enforcement of the policy has been a point of contention. In addition, many factors — such as if the person is unable to get the license for medical reasons or are still in the process of trying to take the class — have complicated the issue.
“Kind of how we got here, we had an issue with one specific school,” said Dr. King. “The principal of that school came to me and asked if employees could be dismissed because they weren’t following this policy. I basically said ‘wait, that’s a district thing that I need to discuss with the board.’ That’s how we got started on this conversation.”
After this, the board agreed to classify a bus driver’s license as an “essential function of the job.” This solved an issue of unverifiable medical exemptions being used to bypass the policy and ensure that the policy was strong and levied across the schools.
“About a year, year and a half ago, when we made that an essential function, that allowed us to enforce it,” said the board’s attorney, Rebecca Williams. “I think one of the problems we had was employees were saying they had all these medical exemptions, but there were a lot of them and they were getting them for reasons we weren’t able to verify. That eliminated those ‘ways out’ of having to do the job. The more exceptions we add into the policy now, the weaker our claim is that it is an essential function.”
The board has previously discussed the issue at length throughout the past few months as a lack of bus drivers has been a problem for the system for several months. Because of the lack of bus drivers within the system, several schools have had delays in either getting children to school or home from school in a timely manner.
“I can’t speak for all the schools, only the ones that my children attend as far as getting messages,” said Warren at the board’s March meeting. “I know Hobbton Middle and they go through spurts, but last week, it was two or three times where it wasn’t going to run any afternoon or it was going to be an hour and a half later. March 5, March 6, and March 9 — Thursday, Friday, and Monday.”
Most recently, school buses were delayed in the system Monday morning, resulting in later arrivals to school and some routes being canceled entirely in the afternoon.