Portsmouth Buses Ready To Roll

The buses will be ready to roll when the new school year starts again on Aug. 31, aaccording to First Student’s Donna Medeiros, branch manager for the bus company.She said preparations have been going on since the last day of the 2010-2011 school year.“We start routing in the spring and get the Kinder list in June. It's been fast and furious this summer as we’ve had 250 new registrations,” said Medeiros.According to Medeiros the Portsmouth First Student fleet has 28 busses driven by 33 drivers with the help of six special needs aids.The bus monitors are employed by the Portsmouth School District, she noted.“We have had the mechanics on-site to inspect each bus and the drivers are having their start-up meeting on Aug. 25. The drivers will have mirror clinics, conduct dry runs and receive their route packages,” said Medeiros.“The next day, Aug. 26, parents and the new kindergarteners of Melville and Hathaway will have a chance to ride the bus together. We will pass out important safety information, too. We think it gives the little ones a chance to see the bus isn’t so scary,” she went on to say.She also said this year’s fourth-graders that are now making the transition from elementary school to the middle school shouldn’t have anything to worry about as far as riding the bus with much older students.“The drivers and bus monitors will seat them by grade with the fourth-graders closer to the front,” she said.“We are ready and we look forward to a great start to the school year,” Medeiros.  The bus routes and schedules are complete, but Medeiros cautioned that the times published are only guidelines as there is a 10-minute window of five minutes before and five minutes after.Check back with Portsmouth Patch later next week for this year's bus schedules.