News & Observer | newsobserver.com | 2008 NCAA Men's Bracket

The school board had a pretty busy day today.

The board elected Kevin Hill as the new chairman and agreed on a procedure for soliciting applicants to fill Rosa Gill's seat.

The board trimmed $3.3 million out of the budget after getting less than requested from commissioners.

CORRECTED LINK FOR BELL SCHEDULE STORY

It looks like parents aren't going to have quite as much flexibility as they would have hoped having their kids ride different buses in the afternoon.

Last month, the school board told staff to put in policy wording that officially says principals can allow students to ride on different buses. But at the urging of principals, board members asked staff to strip out the wording on Tuesday.

Here's the quick background:

Enloe High School's bell schedule will change again and it could impact other schools in the process.

While the details are still being finalized, Enloe is expected to add another 10 minutes to the school day for the 2009-10 school year. This comes on top of the 10 minutes that the school board had agreed to add to Enloe's day as part of the districtwide bell schedule changes for this fall.

The new Enloe change creates additional transportation challenges.

The question of who has the longest bus rides was also on the minds of school board members on Tuesday.

As noted in today's article, staff stressed that voluntary magnet kids account for a majority of the longest bus rides in the district. But students who are bused for diversity also are in the group with the longest rides.

Bob Snidemiller, senior director for transportation, explained that the longest 5 percent of bus ride times have an average one-way ride of 64 minutes.

You can't say the school board isn't doing something to help parents with childcare for the upcoming school year.

As noted in today's article, the board told staff to make it easier for parents to request that their children be dropped off at different bus stops in the afternoon.

Currently, you're only supposed to be dropped off in the afternoon at the same stop where you were picked up in the morning. Exceptions are made for daycare centers and after-school centers that are along on your route.

School districts are being warned they might have problems getting fuel for school buses this week.

The State Department of Public Instruction says fuel vendors are saying that Hurricane Ike has disrputed their fuel supplies. This has left some school districts with only a day or two of fuel remaining.

While Wake says it's ok, Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools is in emergency mode after having not gotten two shipments of fuel. Charlotte has cancelled field trips, middle school sports and tutoring to conserve its supply. 

UPDATE

Read Charlotte's press release.

Today's newspaper doesn't have a lot of great news for Wake's school transportation department.

As noted in an article by Kinea, a first-grade student from Stough Elementary was dropped off at the wrong stop last week. It's at least the third time it's happened this school year.

In a separate article in the North Raleigh News, a mother of a Hilburn Drive Elementary first-grader said her son's first two weeks on the bus were nightmarish. She said his bus broke down twice, didn't come once and injured him when his foot was caught in the door.