School bus ban needs reviewing

By Frank Neill

Eight M ra secondary school students will no longer be able to use the school bus from the beginning of term three.

Because they are not attending their closest state or state-integrated school, they are not eligible for Ministry of Education-funded transport assistance.

This will bring to an end 30 years where the M ara school bus has taken secondary school students across the hill to the Karori bus terminus, regardless of the school they attended.

The transport provider has decided it will no longer transport ineligible students from the start of term three following an increase in the number of students catching the bus, the Ministry of Education’s Group Manager School Transport, James Meffan, says.

That means the bus is nearly at full seated capacity.

“For reasons of safety, the provider is not able to put a larger bus on this route due to the M kara roading conditions,” Mr Meffan says.

The M ara riu Community Board “is taking a position in support of the students in this matter,” the board’ Chair Mark Reid says.

“We have written to the Ministry of Education as a community board and we have requested a meeting with the ministry.”

That letter was sent more than a week before the deadline for this issue of the “Independent Herald” and the community board had not received a response.

“We would like to see the ministry reviewing its decision sensibly,” Mr Reid says, and “we obviously have a lot of support from the M kara community.

“There is no other means of getting across the hill.”

Although more people were moving to M ara to live, the students catching the bus had told him that the bus was never full.

“What’s changed all of a sudden,

ministry?”

The Ministry’s decision to no longer transport students who were not attending the school closest to them “is just wrong,” Mr Reid says.

“”It is excluding them from education and it will not have great outcomes for the kids.”

The decision not to let the eight students catch the bus “is potentially an unsafe situation, because kids may have to cycle across the hill.”

That road was not safe for cyclists, Mr Reid says.

To get on the bus, the students would have to move school, and that prevented them accessing the education of their choice.

M ara was experiencing growth.

However Mr Reid does not see that as a reason why students should not be able to use the school bus.

“Infrastructure has to move with the times and with development, and we are simply asking that the ministry moves with that,” he says.

“While caregivers have the right to choose where they enrol their children, the eligibility criteria for school transport assistance are intended to ensure the ongoing viability and integrity of local schooling networks by supporting students to attend their closest school,” Mr Meffan says.

“This helps to prevent inefficiencies in the network due to excess dema nd at some schools and surplus capacity at others.

“MoE Route D090101 is a school bus service that picks up students living in ara who attend a number of local schools.

“Some of these students meet the eligibility criteria to receive Ministry-funded school transport assistance.

“Students who are not attending the closest school they could enrol in do not meet the eligibility criteria. These students are currently being transported as ineligible students on this service.

“Under our contract with the transport service provider, they can only transport ineligible students if all students, eligible and ineligible, are able to be seated.

“The number of students travelling on this service is increasing which means the bus is nearly at full seated capacity.

“This capacity issue has resulted in the transport service provider deciding that it will no longer transport ineligible students on this service from the start of Term Three, 2023.

“We understand that this will affect approximately eight students,” Mr Meffan says.

The Karori Residents Association is also supporting the move to allow all M ara secondary school students to use the school bus.

“As this service only provides a link to the nearest public transport, the rigid application of MoE’s policy doesn’t really make sense, as it prevents ineligible students the ability to attend school independently,” the association says.

“Any policy which restricts access to this service on a school-byschool basis will disadvantage some students in M kara and have significantimplications for families, some of whom are single parents.

“Declaring ineligible students will result in cost of living increases, more road traffic over the hill, road safety concerns for students needing to walk/cycle/moped over the hill, and even disruption to education outcomes through forced change of schools.

“These are all sub-optimal outcome s driven by a flawed approach to applying an inflexible MoE transport policy,” the association says.

“The outcome that we need is to acknowledge that this rural bus service is a special case, simply enabling essential access to public transport across a difficult hilly stretch of road.

“This would enable all students to easily and independently access public buses and onward school buses to the school they are enrolled in.

“We propose that all high school students are deemed to be eligible to use this service, on the basis that many will otherwise have great difficulty with transport, and therefore be unfairly disadvantaged and unable to consistently attend their education.

“A call for support is being requested from the western community, by emailing to the Ministry of Education viaschool.transport@ education.govt.nz,” the association says.

Temple dinner

The Newlands Kurinchi Kumaran Temple will hold its annual fund-raising dinner on 10 June.

The dinner will begin at 6:30pm and will be held in the Petone Indian Cultural Hall on the corner of Udy and Nelson Streets.

For more information contact Ramesh on 021 220 6667, Nagul on 021 588 359, Selva on 021 144 3293, Rajan on 022 600 7006 or Thas on 021 583 190.

A Staying Safe class for older drivers will be held at the Khandallah Community Centre from 10am to 2pm on 16 August.

The free course is classroom-based and lunch is provided. People attending need to register, and can do this at https://www.acwellington. org.nz/events/staying-safe/.

Staying safe English class

A new group for women who would like to learn and practise spoken English in a relaxed group has begun at the Newlands Community Centre.

Free to attend, the group meets on Wednesday mornings from 10:30 to 11:30am.