As students nationwide return to school, the work completed on school buses throughout the summer helps ensure they start classes with a safe, reliable ride.
Harley Pinson, assistant director of transportation fleet maintenance for Paulding County Schools in Georgia, said each summer mechanics inspect all areas of school buses to establish a baseline of their condition and identify aspects that drivers might not be aware of.
“We try not to prioritize one area over another,” added Pinson, an instructor for the STN EXPO National School Bus Inspection Program and a co-developer of the Georgia Association for Pupil Transportation inspector certification. “This gives us an overall view of the condition of the bus, not just safety-related items, although safety remains our highest priority. We also complete mileage-related maintenance, such as replacing spark plugs and fuel filters, along with oil changes that are due or will become due shortly after the school year begins.”
While noting the importance of checking HVAC, battery, tires and brakes, he said those are not simply summer tasks. “I feel it is important to check these items every time a bus comes in for service, not just during the summer,” he said.
Pinson added that mechanics and technicians also use the summer to update supplemental systems, such as DVR firmware, onboard mapping systems and two-way radios. “In addition, we schedule fire extinguisher inspections, fueling site inspections, and complete any other tasks that are easier to perform while the buses are not in daily route service.”
Meanwhile, in Texas, Duran Hargest III, director of fleet services for Dallas Independent School District in Texas, said during the summer vehicle repairs are their top priority.
“We focus on multiple departments within our fleet, ensuring that everything runs smoothly,” he said. “This includes making sure the air conditioning is functioning properly on our school buses, servicing the reefer units on our refrigerated trucks for food delivery to campuses and maintaining the ground equipment to keep the campuses in good condition.”
Gary Harlow, the shop manager of Coffee County Schools in Tennessee, said the work he prioritizes over summer is safety. “Anything we got to do to be safe for transporting children: The precious cargo,” he said. “We got to make sure safety first and foremost over everything. Whether it be tires, freight shoes, alarm buzzers.”
He said shop technicians aren’t doing their job if they’re not looking for potential mishaps. He said summer is an essential time for catching any problems, especially as during the school year many members of his maintenance team are driving routes.
“I’m big on brake lining, brake wear, drums,” he said, adding techs check all the windows, door buzzers and eight-way lights. “We need to make sure we’re doing our job to the utmost high standard it can possibly be.”
Detailing Summer Maintenance
Georgia’s Pinson said taking care of known issues during the summer allows the team to be better prepared to handle unexpected issues that arise when drivers and students return to school.
“Summer can be a challenging time because many systems are finishing one fiscal year budget while beginning the next,” he said. “If the work is not planned properly, you can run out of funds while still having plenty of work left to complete. Planning work around employee vacations, training and conferences can also be a challenge.”
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Hargest in Texas said that regardless of summer or winter, the maintenance team services the vehicles continuously throughout the year, every 3,000 to 6,000 miles. He noted that fleets could make mistakes when planning summer service, if they don’t have maintenance software to track repairs and alert for overdue services.
Tennessee’s Harlow said catching problems during the summer prevents bigger issues later down in the school year. He said the district does a lot with their buses, including all the fueling on site. So, a common practice when drivers are fueling their buses, the mechanics will be at the fuel island checking oil, brakes and tires.
He said common mistakes are not checking belts, batteries and alternator outputs.
“I come from the trucking world. I got into the [student] transportation side, and I’ve only worked in one shop as far as transportation,” Harlow said. “I really don’t know how other transportation mechanics vibe, but we have discussed, me and my guys, going to other shops and seeing how they operate to see if there’s something we can take away from that.”
