The Daily Commute (Your Child’s)
December 9, 2008 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
Charlie’s bus ride home from school seems to take some 15 minutes, hence my daily rush from work to get to home. The December 8th Newsday reports that more than 1000 special needs children are”sent off Long Island for education and sometimes housing, costing schools and the state millions of dollars.” Two New York state lawmakers and parents are calling on education officials to change regulations that currently limit how many children can be educated at “special sites” on Long Island.
How far does your child—or do you—travel to school?
(Not, it’s hoped, two hours.)
It’s a ten minute drive to take youngest to school since we moved from a short walk away from the school to a different neighbourhood. She could get the bus but her older sister isn’t eligible (the district will only bus her to a new school, closer to our new home).
In a few years, when they’re both at high school, they can ride that bus together!
As the crow flys about 5 miles, for a 6-year-old. About 25-30 minutes on a good day but it can be over an hour for him some days depending on who they pick-up drop and off. Fortunately he’s done well every day for 3 months, except one where he took off his seatbelt 3 times and was very upset. Because his bus was late arriving on a Friday afternoon his school changed the room he was waiting in for the bus without preping him, and that happened to set him off. :/ Because he’s young and he’s had self-moderation issues, and they have only a driver, I had to ride with him he first 3 weeks to ensure everything was going to be fine. Had a plan to make sure he knew the schedule and route could change.
To help he wears one of these 5-points ( http://www.richsafetyrestraints.com/content/view/25/50/ ) to help him stay put. The buckle is behind the seat where he can’t undo it. Unfortunately he’s apparently more than capable of wiggling out anyway. So now it’s seatbelt + the 5-point supplement + a 5/8″ velcro that shadows the seatbelt and sticks together in the back.
P.S. Today, because of snow on the roads causing traffic problems, it apparently took him about 1 hr 40 min to get to school.
@Tyler, that’s a lot of different times—-hope he got home a lot faster than he got there today.
Pete’s school is about 7-10 minutes away, depending on traffic. We live in a smallish suburb (Castro Valley, CA) and really any school he’d attend here is close by cause CV is small. I’m still driving Pete to school, though, because he is uneasy about the bus and it still works with my schedule so it’s no big deal.
That’s because it isn’t a school bus, it’s a “Handibus”. Sort of like a group cab for people with disabilities so it’s more adult centric. Even though he goes to a school that is 100% elementary students with autism, and he primarily rides with them, he can end up with trips scheduled to share with people from the CNIB apartments (blind adults assisted living) and any other number of people who have proven it is not medically not feasible to take normal city transit. The bus is equipped with wheelchair lift in the back.
Frankly I think we are very lucky to have such a service available in spite of the timing quirks.
They used to run separate trips for kids under 6 going to schools/therapy but they discontinued it. Not just because they were running into their capacity limit with just the adult trips but also because the city has had so much growth in recent years that they were having trouble meeting their own criteria that they wouldn’t book a trip for anyone age 5 or less if the trip was expected to take more than 40 minutes at that time of the day.
As you say, 2 hours is just silly for a 5-year-old. A couple of years ago our son would have had real problems with that. Even an older child he rides with has difficulties so that they sometimes change the route to drop the older child off first if he’s showing signs of deteriorating emotional state.
My 15 y.o. travels about 17 miles to school each way – it takes anywhere between 35 and 70 minutes (each way) depending on traffic, who’s on the bus that day … The school is (obviously) not our local public school, and is more than worth the travel time. The teachers all understand the kids and how to work with them. The kids don’t feel like “weirdos” the way many of them did when they were in typical schools, and the classes are suited to the kids’ needs. Unlike in some programs, there are academically challenging courses for gifted kids as well as modified courses for kids who struggle academically.
This year (high school junior) he rides about 30 to 45 minutes each way. The length of the ride is in part because of major bridge construction in town, and part because of wheelchair-bound students who take a little longer to disembark. Amigo doesn’t mind the ride. He’s made friends with the other kiddos and the bus driver, who has a 9-yr-old daughter with Aspergers.
We are lucky – our district’s special autism program for elementary school students is at the elementary school literally less than a mile from our house! It takes me two minutes to make the drive to drop her off or pick her up (or a bit more if I have a long wait making the left turn off of our street).
I feel very badly for the families who have students that live at the other end of the district – 20 minutes away. I made that drive for a summer school program for B and it was a pain. Most of those families put their children on the district’s special bus program but I refuse to put a child that cannot talk on a bus, so I would drive her no matter where she had to go. (I know, I’m lucky to have the option of being able to do that.)
It takes me 15 minutes to get to his school in my car, but his bus ride is an hour each way, given the number of kids being picked up. There are actually programs closer, but since they are all run by incredible jerks, I’d rather have the extra commute and a good teacher any day.
no it’s not two hours…thank goodness. I take him in the morning to avoid a long ride so it’s about 25 minutes. In the afternoon he rides the bus but only for about 15 minutes. Matt is still not 100% potty trained so I have it in his IEP for him to not ride longer than 30 minutes.
My choice, but my college is 21 miles straight-line distance and a 1 1/2 to 2 hour journey (on public transport) each way. There are closer colleges (around 30 minutes -1 hour away) but the one I go to has a course specifically for people on the autistic spectrum, which I’m finding useful.
The travelling is a problem, but I chose to live in this village miles from any college (it’s near where my daughter lives) and I like my flat. If I could drive it would still take an hour to get there, but I’m having problems just getting my provisional driving licence so I can learn.
Last year my son had a one hour bus ride from one site to another. After a full day of Kindergarten he would fall asleep on the bus. This year I take him and pick him up from school, which is only about a 15 minute drive. What a difference!
My daughter’s commute is about 5 miles. However it takes the bus about an hour in the morning and over two in the afternoon. I don’t really understand it either.
Literally less than 2 minutes…as we live right across the road from the kids elementary school. In two years, once he starts middle school – he’ll have a bus ride of maybe 20 minutes at the most (depending where on the route he is picked up/dropped off). We’re pretty fortunate to live in a small suburb within a great commute to Syracuse.
When M was in public schools she was on the bus for about an hour and a half for a school that was about thirty minutes away. The bus was a never ending stress for her and me.
Now, I have to drive her to her new school which I prefer to do anyway. It takes us about fifteen minutes. It is wonderful!
We don’t really have schoolbusses here. Either you take your kids to school or they go on their own, small towns or big towns.
I used to spend 20-30 minutes bicycling to school (and again back home).
Some kids ride a special car, like a shortbus, to school. Or so I suppose, I only ever saw them come home in it, so I guess they went to different schools too.
I never rode a schoolbus when I was growing up in California—always got a ride or walked and, for a time, rode my bike. We considered having Charlie ride his bike to summer school a few years ago when we lived closer to the school, but right now it’s not a realistic possibility not in the early morning (though I guess it would certainly wake him up before he got to school).
Bus arrives at 7 AM and he travels over 45 minutes to get to school.