New School Bus Routines Include Ramped Up Cleaning, Temperature Checks

As in-person instruction becomes available at more schools across the U.S., pupil transporters are putting into place plans for intensified cleaning procedures, and in some cases are including temperature checks on buses.

In Vermont, Barre Union Unified School District’s transportation department staff is cleaning all surfaces on each bus between every run, according to a transportation page on the district's website. Hand sanitizer is available on each bus, seat belt use is discouraged to minimize contact between students, and bus monitors conduct a temperature screening of each student before they can board the bus, according to the website. If a student's temperature is over 100 degrees Fahrenheit, the web page states, “they will be sent home until they are fever free, without the use of any medication, for a minimum of 24 hours.”

The district opened a hybrid in-person learning program on Sept. 8, according to its Facebook page.

Additionally, Stacy Emerson, the operations manager for Student Transportation of Vermont and Mountain Transit, told WCAX that for the multiple districts she serves, drivers now completely spray the bus with a cleaning solution regulated and recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that they let sit for 10 minutes, then clean their own driving area and where the students load and unload, including the handrails.

Emerson also told the news source that the amount of time involved in cleaning procedures has changed significantly: the frequency is two to three times minimum per day, in an effort to maintain student and staff safety.

Similarly, in Illinois, Maroa-Forsyth School District bus drivers are wiping high-touch surfaces after each route, buses are being fogged after each route, and bus monitors are conducting temperature checks of each student before they enter the bus, according to the district’s website.

Meanwhile, Ohio’s Howland Local Schools published a school restart plan on its website that said it would use electrostatic disinfectants on its buses before the start of the school year, and would continue disinfecting measures after a.m. and p.m. routes.

The district also installed temperature scanning devices on all the buses in its fleet, WKBN reports. The students place their foreheads within four inches of the scanner for one second and then either a green indicator light (no temperature) or a red indicator light (temperature indicated) flashes, according to the news source.

Students with a red-light result are required to leave the bus and return home; however, if their guardian is not home and the student is too young to stay home without a guardian, according to WKBN, the student will use the hand sanitizer provided on the bus, sit in the front passenger seat, and the driver will call the principal to notify them that a student with a temperature is on board so that the student can be examined by the school nurse.