JIM GREEN
East Clayton bus driver Sue Atkins checks her mirror to make sure she can see her children.
CLAYTON -- Every weekday, Sue Atkins works 7 1/2 hours as a teaching assistant at East Clayton Elementary School. Then she gets on a bus and drives exceptional children from East Clayton and Powhatan Elementary safely to their homes. Considered a requirement for keeping her teacher's assistant job - under a policy adopted by Johnston County Schools in 1989 - Atkins enjoys the second job.
"I do it because I love children," said Atkins, a 13-year bus driving veteran. "It's a good feeling to know that you can affect a child's life in a good way. When they get on the bus, whether it be in the morning or afternoon, they might have had a bad day just like we adults do. If you smile at them and are friendly, that might make a difference in their whole day."
Atkins has done it all when it comes to her bus-driving career in the county school district. She has driven high school, middle school and elementary children. She has driven the morning routes (which can start around 5:30 a.m.) and the afternoon routes (which start after school, typically 3:30). She has driven full buses (72 kids) and currently drives seven EC students from ECES and Powhatan.
Atkins and the other bus drivers are being recognized by JCS this week as part of Love the Bus/Bus Driver Appreciation Week for the work they do.
Johnston County employs 671 bus drivers to ferry 22,834 students to and from 44 schools every day.
Atkins started her teaching assistant job at ECES in the fall of 1998. She has been a TA for kindergarten and second graders but has spent the past nine years with third graders.
Atkins earned her CDL in February 1999. She had to attend a three-day class and then pass three separate tests, all administered by the Department of Motor Vehicles. That was followed by driving for three days and passing that test. Once a month, Atkins and the other county bus drivers meet with the county bus coordinator to discuss rules, safety and any changes in those areas.
"This job is more than just picking kids up and dropping them off," she said. "In a classroom, teachers have TAs for around 20-24 children. The responsibility for a bus driver where safety is concerned is much more because the ratio is way unbalanced. These buses can have up to 72 kids on them, and the drivers have no monitors - you are the driver and the monitor. If anything goes wrong, you are in charge. There is no one to help you."
Atkins, who has a monitor on her exceptional children's bus, said the challenge is being alert as a driver, whether you have been a teaching assistant for nearly eight hours or whether driving is the employee's first job.
"My job is to get these kids from point A to point B safely," she said. "It doesn't matter that I worked 7 1/2 hours prior to getting on the bus - I am required to be as alert as if it was my first job."
Karen Camacho, a child nutrition assistant at River Dell Elementary School, has been driving a bus since the school year started when she obtained her CDL.
"The kids are not that bad," said Camacho, who drives elementary and middle schoolers. "The routes are rather easy and it's like driving with a bunch of kids in the back of a van."
In addition to being licensed and having to keep up with the latest rules and policies adopted by the county, Atkins, Camacho and all the county bus drivers are required to conduct pre-trip and post-trip inspections of their vehicles. If there are problems, they call the bus coordinator and wait until help arrives. Atkins even had to expel a middle school student for drinking on the bus.
"Fights usually happen in middle school," she said. "By the time they get to high school, they pretty much know the rules and don't try to push it, especially with the bus driver."
