Transportation is Vital for Education!

By: Jules Pizano

Many kids at my high school had the luxury of driving themselves home or having their parents pick them up after school. For me, my parents worked all day so this meant I had to take the bus to and from school. This meant waking up early to catch the bus at 6AM to get to school in time for zero period that started at 7AM. California doesn’t require school districts to provide buses to students even if they live far away and have transportation barriers. While my school district provided buses, there were many issues with them due to lack of funding. More often than not the bus would come to my stop late and sometimes wouldn’t even show up. There was no way to see when buses would come and I would wait at the bus stop for a while wondering if I would have reliable transportation to school. My mom would eventually have to drive me all the way to school on the other side of town, which would make her late for work. 

Since I had a zero period, I had to wait an extra hour to get home because the buses only came after 6th period. Our high school buses would drive all the kids in the city, including elementary and middle school students. Only after taking these kids home would the bus pick us up, often a half hour or more late. The bus itself was scolding hot and packed with 3 high schoolers per row and windows we couldn’t roll down. There was nothing more I wanted to do than go home after a long day of school but there were times where the bus would break down and we would have to wait for someone to come fix it or transfer to a new bus. The lack of reliable transportation not only affected my punctuality but also my ability to concentrate and perform well in my early morning classes. The constant uncertainty of whether the bus would show up or break down added unnecessary stress to my already demanding academic life. Education is a fundamental right, and inadequate transportation systems should not hinder students from accessing quality learning opportunities. Students deserve to have their holistic well-being supported and this means having physical access to educational institutions which are safe! It is important for policymakers to address these transportation barriers and invest in safe and efficient means of getting students to and from school, ensuring educational opportunities for all.