During my introduction for a presentation at a Tennessee school district last week, the superintendent told attendees about the worst day of his long career in education.
In a frank and compelling manner, he told his employees how a young girl had died when she was hit by a truck. In a gripping and straightforward manner, he related how a relatively new and inexperienced substitute driver had deviated from the normal drop off procedure. Partly as a result of this deviation in protocol, the young girl was run over by a large truck and killed as the driver, her sibling, her mother and a bus load of students watched in horror.
The superintendent related how the settlement in the ensuing litigation had not been able to heal the pain the girl’s family felt. He also related that he felt the driver’s death from a heart attack six months after the tragedy was probably linked directly to the severe guilt the driver felt. It was obvious that the superintendent is still deeply affected by this tragedy and will be for the rest of his life. His powerful message was intended to remind the employees in his school district of the awesome responsibility they each accept when they come to work each day. Fortunately, tragedies like the one described by the superintendent are extremely rare when we consider the millions of students who are transported millions of miles in our nation every school day.
No school employee bears more of an awesome responsibility than our nation’s school bus drivers, aides, supervisors and transportation directors. Given the incredible record of safety established by our nation’s pupil transportation personnel, no one has borne the awesome responsibility for student safety any better.
Mike Dorn is the executive director of Safe Havens International, a global, non-profit school safety center for kindergarten through 12th grade. He is a former school district police chief for Bibb County, Ga., a former school safety specialist for the Georgia Emergency Management Agency and a former anti-terrorism planner and lead program manager at the Georgia Office of Homeland Security.
