Bus service in GCISD is available for students who reside more than two miles from their designated school. The two-mile calculation is measured from the student's front door to the front door of the school using the shortest, legally traveled path available to motor vehicles. Please note that tools like MapQuest do not properly calculate the length of routes.  For students residing less than two miles from school, space available transportation may be an option on an existing bus route.  A per semester or annual fee is required for this service.

GCISD currently runs 18 elementary routes, 20 middle school routes and 14 high school routes and transports 28% of students who live more than two miles from school and less than 1% of students as pay riders.  In the past few years, the District has added routes for special education, advanced academic and bilingual programs based on changes in these programs and a growing trend of students requiring transportation services.

GCISD averages 2,000 field trips per year, of which 400 are usually handled by coaches and special education teachers.   Monthly, an average of 225 buses are utilized to handle field trips with many of those trips departing before 3:30 p.m. 

EXPLANATION FOR WHY BELL SCHEDULES ARE CHANGING

The amount of roadway construction in the area planned for the next five years will significantly impact the ability of buses to navigate detours, traffic and accidents in order to meet schedules.  (See Roadway Construction Planned 2008-2013.) 

Changes to the school bell schedules will reduce student wait time for routes, issues with handling athletic and field trips, the frequency that bus students are late to school, and to allow sufficient time between routes to handle traffic congestion, accidents and roadway construction.

A 42-member committee of parents and staff was formed in the spring of 2008 to address the problems with the current school bell schedules.  The committee’s charge was, “to consider any and all aspects of school schedules while looking at academic needs, intervention opportunities, student developmental needs and related services.” The committee considered the following:

• An operational report about Transportation and a description of the current problems affecting students and schools based on the current bell schedule
• Information about planned roadway construction through 2013
• A report about schedules and transportation for athletics and activities and the impact of a school bell change
• Information about sleep studies and students
• Eight proposed school bell schedules
• Pros and cons of each schedule as reported by campus administrators

After five months of discussions, the committee reached consensus on bell schedules that they believe provides the most benefits, the least disruption, is most equitable to all schools and families and addresses the problems with the current bell schedules. The GCISD Board of Trustees approved the new schedules on Jan. 12, 2009. The benefits of the new bell schedules are:

• Reduces student wait time, campus discipline issues and the need for staff to monitor students
• Provides sufficient time for routes to handle roadway construction, traffic congestion and accidents
• Allows for more efficient bus services with current number of buses via a three-tiered transportation system
• Improves the scheduling and efficiency of field trips
• Reduces the time students are out of class and the cost of field trips due to “take and return” trips that result in double mileage charges
• A later start time for secondary students is consistent with recommendations from the National Sleep Foundation regarding start times for secondary school students
• Provides greater flexibility for middle school academic offerings
• Supports crime research that encourages schools to dismiss later in the school day after the prime-time crime times for adolescents
• Provides the ability to more effectively handle future growth of shuttles and special programs
• Increases flexibility to allow for zero-hour classes
• Provides increased time for before-school tutorials and interventions
• Provides additional opportunities for after-school enrichment and tutorial programs for elementary students
• Opportunity to offer breakfast at schools that don’t presently offer this program, if sufficient parents are interested in it

The committee believes the proposed bell schedules are a good compromise.  Each grade level is affected by only fifteen minutes and, therefore, the proposed schedules place the least amount of burden on any grade level.