Bullhead City School District leaders told the board on Nov. 20 that a bus-driver accident and a lack of substitutes left two routes (Sunrise and Fox Creek) without service, affecting an estimated 80 students.

Dr. Stewart said the district sent notices through SchoolMessenger but that the system's earliest outbound notification window is 6 a.m., which can be too close to bus times. "The incident had occurred over the weekend... I put it out on SchoolMessenger," she said, adding the district also posts on social media and uses phone and email to notify families.

Board members pressed staff about mitigation options. Trustees asked whether running a later or partial route so students could attend half-days would be feasible; transportation staff and Dr. Stewart explained that drivers and buses are scheduled in chains (early high-school routes feed elementary routes later in the morning), so reassigning a bus would create afternoon-return problems and could require additional drivers for students to get home.

The board discussed alternative approaches including recruiting and training additional drivers (the district offers free training), borrowing a driver from the high school when available, and exploring city-bus options. Dr. Stewart said the district recently hired an additional driver and that they continue to recruit but applicants remain scarce.

Why it matters: Missed routes can produce large attendance and instructional impacts for affected students and add strain to families. Trustees asked staff to measure how many students missed school when routes fail, and to report back with options to reduce lost instruction.

Next steps: Transportation staff will check site-by-site attendance for affected days and return with a summary of how many students missed school because of the route cancellations and what mitigation options are feasible.

Representative quote: "About 80 students," Dr. Stewart said of the number affected across the two routes; "We send out the notice as soon as we can," she added.