Every weekday many students ride the bus to and from school. Some even ride the bus to and from sporting events. But what is often forgotten about are the wonderful drivers of the buses.

Bus drivers take time out of their personal lives, and sometimes they take time away from their other jobs, to drive the bus and get students to and from school safely. They go through multiple classes and take special tests just to be able to drive the bus. “I had to pass the Commercial Driver’s License test at the DMV for the Class B certification, the transit bus, student, and air brake endorsements. I then had to take a class at the bus shop and ride then drive with another bus driver before executing the final assessment. It actually was rather time consuming,” said THS bus driver and English teacher Denise Dallas.

Many bus drivers at Tunstall have other jobs along with their job of being a bus driver. Mrs. Denise Dallas is an English teacher here at THS and Mrs. Jennifer Kroffe is an English teacher at the middle school. Mrs. Dallas has taught English here since 1997 and she started driving the bus ten years ago. Mrs. Kroffe has been teaching English at TMS since 2019 but she has been driving her bus for six years.

“Driving the bus has given me an opportunity to interact with my students and get to know them better,” said Mrs. Dallas. Many bus drivers say getting to know their students is the best part of driving the bus. 

Because of the bus driver shortage a few bus drivers have started taking two routes. 

Both Mrs. Kroffe and Mrs. Dallas have said that student safety is their number one priority. They both do everything they can to make sure that they get students where they need to be safely.

Despite everything that bus drivers do for students they can often forgotten about and not appreciated. In the last few days of school students should show their bus driver how much they appreciate them. Giving a bus driver a simple thank you could mean the world to them.