Waterford School District is canceling certain bus routes throughout the week because of a shortage of bus drivers, with the changes taking effect this past Monday. For parents who rely on the bus to get their kids to and from school, the shift has meant sudden schedule juggling and little certainty about when — or whether — a bus will show up.
According to FOX 2 Detroit, the district confirmed it is dealing with a driver shortage and is canceling certain routes throughout the week as a result. Parent Sarah Dalton said the disruption has upended her daily routine. “I have to completely rearrange my Monday through Friday,” Dalton said, explaining she now has to arrive at work late, leave early, and personally drop off and pick up her child every day.
Dalton said she can no longer depend on her child's bus and doesn't know when or where it will drop her daughter off. She said the district's offered options are unacceptable, arguing that education should be accessible to everyone, and that the district should take accountability and prioritize students and their education.
District Says Full Service Will Return Once New Drivers Are Trained
The district says its objective is to keep the route cancellation rotations temporary, restoring full service once newly hired drivers finish their required training and routes are optimized for greater efficiency, per the district's statement to the station's report. The Waterford School District Transportation Department states that its primary mission is to safely and efficiently transport students to and from school, according to the Waterford School District's transportation page. The department also says it displays messages when a bus is delayed by 20 minutes or more and advises families to keep a backup transportation plan in place.
In a separate statement to WXYZ, the district said, “We are currently reviewing every bus route, reassigning drivers where they are needed most and actively looking for new drivers.” That same report noted five routes were canceled on a Tuesday across elementary, middle and high schools — the second straight day of disruptions — and described a separate incident in which a substitute driver unfamiliar with a route got lost, leaving Riverside Elementary students 40 minutes late to school and an hour late getting home.
Part of a Wider Michigan Staffing Crunch
Waterford's troubles reflect a problem playing out across Michigan. Transportation departments statewide are increasingly prioritizing daily home-to-school routes over extracurricular travel as the driver shortage persists, according to WNEM. The outlet reported that 71% of surveyed school district administrators faced at least one direct operational disruption from bus driver shortages over the past year, with consequences including longer commute times, combined routes, employee burnout and the elimination of field trips and extracurricular travel.
Roughly 78% of districts nationwide have taken substantive measures to stay afloat, WNEM reported, including consolidating bus runs, raising starting wages or assigning driving duties to non-transportation staff. Becoming a school bus driver in Michigan isn't a quick process either — applicants must undergo extensive background checks, federal physical exams and intensive passenger safety training, per the same outlet. When districts can't fill enough seats behind the wheel, they often consolidate routes, adjust pickup times, or ask existing drivers to take on additional runs, according to School Transportation News.
State Funding and Other Districts' Fixes
Michigan has provided $125 million to schools since 2023 to help fund transportation costs, according to WXYZ's earlier reporting on metro Detroit districts. Utica Community Schools, for instance, was still looking to fill between 25 and 30 open bus-driver positions, with pay ranging from $21 to $28 an hour, the station reported. Some Michigan districts have turned to hiring bonuses and efforts to build a more enjoyable workplace culture to recruit drivers.
For now, Waterford families are left navigating day-to-day uncertainty while the district works through its hiring and training backlog. Dalton's frustration echoes a broader theme in Michigan's transportation crunch: parents bearing the logistical cost of a staffing problem they didn't create, while districts promise the disruptions are temporary.
