School transportation options in New Jersey are limited compared to other states, but voters support changes that would bring the Garden State in line with best practices nationally, an FDU Poll released Tuesday morning indicates.
The latest results from the FDU Poll, in partnership with New Jersey Friends of Affordable Safe Student Transportation (NJ FASST), show voters, by a wide margin, favor opening up the school transportation system to allow schools to contract more widely for transportation services for homeless or disabled children.
“There’s not really a great case to be made for limiting the options school districts have in transporting students,” Dan Cassino, the executive director of the FDU Poll, said. “Some kids have special needs, and voters are ok with giving schools flexibility to address their needs.”
Overall, 63 percent of voters in New Jersey support the proposal to allow private drivers to transport homeless and disabled students to school, with 33 percent opposed.
Here’s the interesting part: Support is about equal among Republicans (61 percent) and Democrats (65 percent).
“In New Jersey, education is the one thing that Republicans and Democrats can always agree on,” Cassino said. “There’s no partisan way to get kids to school.”
Perhaps that’s because everyone likes to spend money prudently.
Advocates say that the policy helps to address the unsustainable costs of New Jersey’s current approach for school districts and taxpayers. At a time where school districts are cutting programs and laying off teachers and staff, student transportation is often one of the largest line items in a school district’s budget.
Under current law in New Jersey, all school transportation has to be carried out by school bus drivers employed by bus companies or districts, approved school personnel or parents.
This puts the state at odds with most others, where alternative transportation services are commonly used to transport children with disabilities that might make traditional yellow school buses difficult, and homeless children, who may need to be picked up from different addresses during a school year.
Currently in New Jersey, bus and van drivers used for these purposes need to have a Commercial Driver’s License and undergo background checks and monitoring.
Because alternative student transportation primarily serves students with individualized needs, rules in other states have provisions focusing on single-pupil transportation, rather than large groups of students: smaller personal vehicles designed including minivans, sedans, and SUVs that carry eight passengers or fewer.
In states that permit alternative student transportation, drivers still must undergo rigorous background checks, continuous vehicle monitoring, and comply with other safeguards. But, unlike New Jersey, drivers do not need to have a Commercial Driver’s License since they are not operating the larger vehicles (like buses and semi-trucks) for which such licenses were principally designed.
A new group of advocates hopes to pave a road to similar modern transportation options for New Jersey’s students.
The New Jersey Friends of Affordable Safe Student Transportation coalition includes parents, educators, nonprofits, small businesses, and taxpayers seeking a legislative fix to allow alternative student transportation. Its members include the New Jersey Association of Special Education Partner Schools, Great Schools of New Jersey, the New Jersey Business and Industry Association, and more.
All have united around a common goal of ensuring that students have the option of transportation tailored to better serve students with more individualized needs.
It’s an idea that other states have embraced.
According to NJ FASST, forty-one states have already passed laws that increase flexibility for school districts while at the same time providing for more affordable and safer transportation options.
