ST. LOUIS — Hundreds of students across the city waited up to an hour for late buses on the first day of school Monday amid a severe driver shortage.
ºüÀêÊÓƵ Public Schools officials said last week that nearly 3,500 students at eight schools would not have bus transportation for at least the first two weeks, including Central, Collegiate, Gateway, Roosevelt, Sumner and Vashon high schools and Mallinckrodt and Wheeler elementary schools.
Buses assigned to at least another eight schools were up to an hour late Monday picking up students, according to interviews with parents and posts on social media. Afternoon buses were also late bringing children home.
The city school district switched its transportation contract from First Student to Missouri Central this year after problems with late buses and missed routes in the spring.
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Missouri Central needs to hire 25 more drivers to cover the 16,500 students who take the bus to 58 schools across the city, company leaders said last week.
SLPS Superintendent Kelvin Adams last week said students in the affected high schools can receive Metro Transit bus passes. Elementary students can attend before care at the schools for free. Families can also receive weekly $75 gas station gift cards on Fridays if the student has perfect attendance.
Students with special needs will still be provided bus transportation, and the district will continue to use taxi companies in some cases, Adams said.
Other school districts including Fox in Jefferson County and Affton and Parkway in ºüÀêÊÓƵ County reduced the number of bus routes this year because of the bus driver shortage.
More first-day-of-school updates from across the region:
School board vacancy
Traci Moore will resign from the University City School Board as of Sept. 1 because she no longer lives or owns a business in the city, according to an Aug. 4 letter to board President Matt Bellows and Superintendent Sharonica Hardin-Bartley.
“Please know it’s been an honor and pleasure to serve as a board member ... our district is lucky to have such a strong group of people act as the voice of the community,†Moore wrote.
Moore, director of creative services at the University of Missouri-ºüÀêÊÓƵ, was elected to the board in April 2020. The district is accepting applications for a board member to complete Moore’s term, which expires in April 2023.
Applicants will be interviewed at the Sept. 15 board meeting, followed by a vote for the new member.
New schools open
Two new schools opened in the region Monday. North Point Middle School is the fourth middle school in Wentzville and shares a campus with North Point High School, which opened in fall 2021.
The school district, which has more than 17,300 students, was the fastest-growing in Missouri until last year, when Troy took the top spot.
The Leadership School in Pagedale also opened Monday as the first charter school in the state outside of ºüÀêÊÓƵ or Kansas City. The school welcomed students in kindergarten, first and second grades with plans to grow an additional grade each year, eventually growing to 450 students through eighth grade.
Two warehouse buildings on Pennsylvania Avenue were converted into classrooms and offices over the past few months.
Charter schools are publicly funded but operate independently of the school district. In Missouri, they are allowed to open in districts that have provisional accreditation including the Normandy Schools Collaborative.
Charges in Metro East school threat
Two Shiloh men have been charged in connection to a threat made Friday against the Whiteside School District in Belleville.
Police received a call about a threat toward Whiteside schools on Friday morning as students were arriving. Officers from the Shiloh police and St. Clair County Sheriff’s Department provided extra security at the district’s elementary and middle schools. Two men who live in the school district were arrested, but police said they had no other connection to the schools.
On Monday, Jeremy Gunter, 46, was charged with felony disorderly conduct for threatening a school. Joseph Lowman, 42, was charged with felony possession of a firearm and ammunition by a prior felon.
The men are being held at the St. Clair County Jail.