ST. LOUIS — Only one out of three of Robin Lovings Brown’s children were picked up for school Monday as the transportation crisis in ºüÀêÊÓƵ Public Schools made for a chaotic morning.
“Why do we have to go through this?†Lovings Brown asked. “The kids are stressed. The parents are stressed. All of this is a mess.â€
It’s been a scramble at SLPS for months after primary bus vendor Missouri Central canceled its contract with the district. A mix of buses, taxis and rideshares from 19 different vendors plus Metro city buses were expected to deliver students to school.
Attendance on Monday was 72% of projected enrollment, acting Superintendent Millicent Borishade said at a news conference. That means about 5,300 students did not make it to school.
When asked what she would say to disappointed parents, Borishade said, “I stand with them. It should be better, and we’re working to make it better.â€
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On Monday, multiple yellow buses from the largest vendor First Student were seen dropping off one to three passengers at schools. For many others, the bus never came. Taxi services seemed to be more reliable, although not always on time.
As many as 1,600 high school students were offered MetroBus passes, but fewer than 200 rode public transportation to school Monday, according to operator Bi-State Development. Several parents previously told the Post-Dispatch that they felt uncomfortable with the arrangement.
Lovings Brown got off to a good start when Ayvah, 11, was picked up at 6:03 a.m. at home in the Hyde Park neighborhood by a taxi minivan. The driver said he was assigned to take six kids to Busch Middle School, 9 miles away in ºüÀêÊÓƵ Hills.
Amaya, 15, was supposed to be picked up by a First Student bus at 7:20 a.m. for the trip to Collegiate School of Medicine & Bioscience near Tower Grove Park. Lovings Brown called the company when the bus was due to arrive, and a dispatcher said it was coming in 20 minutes. One hour later, she ordered an Uber for the teenager, who would be at least half an hour late to school.
Finally Aden, 5, waited in vain for the bus to take him to the first day of kindergarten at Stix Early Childhood Center in the Forest Park Southeast neighborhood. Lovings Brown called another Uber to take Aden to school and then drop her off at work at Gateway 180 Homeless Services. Lovings Brown spent at least $50 for the rideshares.
“I’m all for making sure my kids get their education, but I’m in a crisis and trying to pay out-of-pocket is hard,†she said. “I don’t have the funds, but we’re going to make it happen.â€
Lovings Brown, who is board president of the Old North Restoration Group, said she loves the SLPS schools where her children excel in academics and extracurriculars. She just wants to know they have transportation so she can “look forward to continuing to be a proud mom.â€
At McKinley Classical Leadership Academy in south ºüÀêÊÓƵ, eighth grader Arthur Bickers arrived in a white minivan taxi five minutes after classes began at the magnet school. He hopped out of the backseat in a rush to the middle school’s entrance, finding it had already been locked.
Arthur said he’d normally ride the school bus, but the ride in the van was “pretty enjoyable,†even though he felt a little crowded with his “really long legs.â€
“It’s a little strange,†Arthur said. “I got lucky. I’m the second kid to get picked up, so (the driver) was pretty on time for me. For a lot of the other kids, it was later.â€
About 10 minutes earlier, Tiearies Thompson had just finished following his daughter, a sixth grader, on her route to school in a third-party minivan. Thompson trailed the van in his own car, and he planned to do the same for his youngest child, a fifth grader at Betty Wheeler Classical Junior Academy.
“I need to know they’re going to get there safely,†Thompson said.
His youngest child is supposed to take a First Student bus to Betty Wheeler, “but we’ll see,†Thompson said.
“Everybody is in this constant state of not knowing what’s going on and figuring out what’s next,†he said.
Mecca Baker said she got a letter on Friday notifying her that her son, Shawn Baker, a fourth grader at Wheeler, would no longer be using a rideshare company called HopSkipDrive.
The district had “found a bus,†Baker said, and Shawn would wait on a corner nearby their house for it to arrive by 8:49 a.m.
Only by 9:10 a.m., the bus didn’t show. Baker decided to give up on the bus and drive her son to school. Normally, she would already have been at her IT job.
“It’s a little chaotic, but we’re optimistic,†Baker said.
At Columbia Elementary in the Jeff-Vander-Lou neighborhood, several parents and grandparents walked their students to school.
Two First Student buses transported a total of four kids. One unmarked Ford F-150 pickup with an “SLPS Transportation†sign on its dashboard dropped off three students.
Columbia was one of three schools Tangina Branch had to take her kids to on Monday morning. She also made stops at Vashon, Gateway STEM, and Central Visual and Performing Arts high schools all within the span of one hour.
Branch was more than an hour late to work and said she’s worried about what she’ll do after school.
“I’ll have to leave work to get them,†Branch said. “It’s horrible. A lot of kids are going to miss the first day of school because a lot of parents don’t have transportation.â€
Tauna Cowin’s 10-year-old daughter missed school because the bus didn’t come to take her to Madison Elementary. Her son’s school bus also didn’t show up, so he took two Metro buses to Soldan High.
“This is crazy,†Cowin said. “We’ll see how the rest of the week plays out.â€
Too many schools?
Transportation issues aren’t unique to SLPS. A national school bus driver shortage has led to the service cancellations at schools across the country.
What’s different about ºüÀêÊÓƵ is the magnet school system, which means more kids need transportation across the city than can walk to neighborhood schools. The city’s 30 charter schools, which are tuition-free but independent from SLPS, further complicate the landscape. Buses from charters Lift for Life and Confluence Academies were seen passing through the same neighborhoods as the SLPS buses and taxis.
It all adds up to the challenge of running about 100 schools for 28,000 students in ºüÀêÊÓƵ, when similar-sized districts have half the number of schools.
Shortly after 6 a.m., Gladys Epps, 14, and Tyrell Sawyer, 11, were standing at a MetroBus stop off Kingshighway Boulevard in the Kingsway West neighborhood of ºüÀêÊÓƵ, waiting for a bus to take them to Kairos Academies charter school.
Sirens from police vehicles speeding by blared while crickets chirped in knee-high weeds behind them. A man slept on the bus stop’s bench.
Tyrell said he used to take the school bus but started to take Metro last year because his bus rarely showed. Gladys said she would rather take a school bus.
Metro has “a lot of creeps,†she said. “Being on the bus by myself as a girl without my parent, it’s just different.â€
After school, some students had a hard time finding their way home.
Laith Altamimi, 14, walked up to the nearest Metro stop confused. He said he had never ridden the bus before, and he wasn’t sure where the bus that stopped nearest Gateway STEM, his new school, would go.
“I’m just trying to find a way to get home,†he said. “My dad’s busy with work.â€
Laith put his address into Google Maps on his phone. It told him the nearest bus stop he needed was a 10 minute walk up Kingshighway to Manchester Avenue. Then, from a second stop, another 10-minute walk in the heat to get to his house.
“It wasn’t on my mind,†Laith said when asked if he requested a Metro pass from school. “I just wanted to get to my classes and get through what’s important. It’s my first day here.â€