At the 2024 National School Transportation Associations Annual Meeting & Convention held in Nashville, Tennessee, the national association representing state directors of pupil transportation released the results of its twelfth survey on illegal passing of stopped school buses.
In 35 states throughout the country and the District of Columbia approximately 26.4% percent of the nation’s school bus drivers participated in a one-day survey to report motorists who passed their stopped school buses. In the survey, 98,065 school bus drivers reported that 66,322 vehicles passed their buses illegally on a single day during the 2023-2024 school year. Adjusting for 100% of the school bus drivers in the U.S., we would have seen just over 251,000 illegal passings. Projected across a 180-day school year, these sample results point to more than 45.2 million violations per year among America’s motoring public. As the projected violations for the 2022-2023 school year were 43.5 million, we continue to see the problem of the illegal passing of stopped school buses increase.
“The illegal passing of stopped school buses continues to be the greatest safety danger to children. We at the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services hope the results of this survey remind all motorists to pay attention to the yellow school bus, to follow the laws in their state, and stop to allow for the safe loading and unloading of each school bus, and to their part for the safety of our children. We encourage each state to use this information to bring attention to this critical safety issue and engage all resources necessary to ensure each child is protected,” stated NASDPTS President Mike Stier.
This survey has been conducted annually since 2011, with the exception of 2020 and 2021 when the survey was not conducted due to the COVID-19 Pandemic and the resulting school closures across the country. The survey results have brought greater attention by state and federal policy makers to the need for greater safety countermeasures. In recent years, several states have increased penalties for violations, authorized the use of photo evidence for issuing citations, or enacted other measures designed to deter this dangerous practice.
Complete information on the project, including the detailed results from the 2024 survey, and prior years, can be found athttps://www.nasdpts.org/stop-arm-violations.