School building personnel are often well-trained in how to protect themselves and students against potential threats within the school. But bus drivers are often left out, leaving a critical gap in knowledge about how drivers can safely transport their previous cargo. 

Bus drivers are essentially first responders in their own right; because active threats often escalate before police arrive on the scene, they must know how to take control in a worst-case possible situation.

Make sure to tune in to October’s episode of The Route to hear more on this topic!

The Birth of a Threat Training Program for School Bus Drivers

S.T.A.R.T. CEO Jim Levine studied criminal justice and forensic science, and now boasts over 50 years in active duty law enforcement with SWAT experience.  It was in a role as a school resource officer that Levine realized school bus drivers lacked the same support and training that district staff inside the buildings often receive. 

“Our state police organization comes here, checks buses all the time, but they've never really given a program to our drivers on those topics,” he said. “So I thought to myself, ‘well, you know what? We really need to do that.’” 

Cue the start of his company around 2015.

“I think probably the most important part of the program that we developed was a hands-on, scenario-based training module that would recreate what it would feel like and sound like to be in an active threat situation, especially a firearm on board the bus.”

S.T.A.R.T., which stands for School Transportation Active-Threat Response Training, now equips drivers and transportation teams with the training they need to recognize, prevent, and respond to active threats before police arrive. In it, participants go through threat detection and de-escalation training with a host of experts like Secret Service, mental health pros, and more.

3 Warning Signs to Watch For

1. Look for changes in patterns of a student’s behavior. That may mean something is amiss at home or they’re going through troubling times. “The bus driver is really in the best position to spot (changes in behavior) in many cases, because they see the kids all the time, more so maybe than a teacher, who only sees the student for one year.” This can also include knowing what bags or objects a student typically brings on the bus so you can spot if something dangerous may be brought on that usually isn’t.

2. Watch for bullying on the bus, which can be a precursor to someone who may become a threat to the school and to their peers, “especially if they feel like the peers are the ones who have caused them to have these bad feelings,” Levine encouraged.

3. Look for items left on that bus that could be key indicators a student is on a path of destruction. These could be a notebook or a crumpled-up piece of paper that reads “today is the day.”

“We know that it's a very thin line between suicide and homicide,” Levine said, referencing a situation at a Northeastern Ohio school. There, a student became an active shooter after bringing a gun on the school bus, using it to kill three kids and wound three others once he was dropped off. That driver now has the worst case of PTSD Levine has seen.

Key Steps for Threat Preparedness

1. Be hypervigilant. Know the students on your bus (and parents at bus stops), as well as usual surroundings and scenes on your route, so you know when something is off. Keep a close eye out for the warning signs noted above to try and prevent violence before it happens. 

2. Documentation: Administrators should have an emergency operations plan (which should cover both natural disasters and violence) that includes school bus response and share that with bus drivers. If a threat is on board the bus, drivers should know how to diffuse a situation, protect other students, and find safe alternate locations to drive to so they don’t bring the threat to the school.

3. Communication must include all. For instance, if there is an incident unfolding at the school and some buses have not yet completed drop off, drivers should be informed not to bring students on site until the threat has been handled. 

4. Training: Transportation (and other district staff such as groundskeepers and janitors) should receive training on how to spot and respond to threats — often, these positions have a better ability to see something that teachers can miss. De-escalation skills are a must for anyone who could encounter violence. “Failure to train is a huge issue if something happens,” Levine said.

5. Think ahead. Drivers should be able to respond quickly to changing situations. This can come down to how and where they park in case a quick escape is needed.

6. Go with your gut. If something feels off, it’s always better to report it than not. Levine said he’d always rather respond to a false alarm than miss a real threat because someone was afraid to say something. 

7. Get to know SROs. School resource officers can also be a resource to transportation. Develop a mutually beneficial relationship to help each other identify and respond to threats to safety.

8. Don’t forget field trips. Drivers should check their buses for sabotage from opposing teams or individuals anytime the bus lets all students off. Walk through for suspicious items that weren’t there before letting students back on board.

“We've been fortunate to this day that we haven't had a significant event (on the bus itself),” Levine said. “But we're a much more violent society now than we were.”

That's why it's so critical for bus drivers to recognize their importance and be acknowledged as a vital link in ensuring the safety of the school district and that child.

Another pro to equipping drivers with this training is it can help retain the drivers you have. “We have a national crisis of the retention of bus drivers,” he said, and “I absolutely believe that part of that is because the drivers don't know how to protect their kids, and that's a heavy burden to bear. Once they get the tools on their belt, they feel much more comfortable about going out there and transporting the kids.”

He added that administrators need to fall on their swords with this subject, because there are two courts to answer to should something happen: Civil court will bring substantial lawsuits if kids are killed or hurt on a bus, and the court of public opinion means you have to look parents in the eye and tell them you did everything you could to prevent that situation. 

“I'm tired of trying to explain to superintendents, you have a responsibility to your bus drivers, and you have a responsibility to families and to the community to give bus drivers the training they need to keep these kids safe,” Levine said.

Grant Opportunity Alert

Levine calls out a grant from the Department of Justice available to support bus driver training. The FY 25 Student, Teachers, and Officers Preventing (STOP) School Violence Program is now open to provide funding to prevent violence in K-12 school settings by implementing behavioral threat assessments and/or intervention teams and technological solutions that assist in preventing school-based violence.

There are two categories for up to $1 million or $2 million per award for no-cost training and assistance.

Applications on grant.gov close Oct. 27, 2025, while JustGrants closes Nov. 3, 2025.

For more information on the grant, click here, and to book training with S.T.A.R.T, visit www.schoolbusstart.com.