Columbia's Walking School Bus program postponed for fall semester

Columbia, Missouri's outstanding Walking School Bus program has been used as a model for similar programs nationwide.  Hundreds of students walk to school together every day, in groups supervised by a Walking School Bus leader.  The program promotes good health, better academics, better behavior, and saves on pollution, congestion, and transportation costs for parents and the school district. 

Walking School Bus logo (PedNet)

But now Columbia's Walking School Bus program has been postponed for fall semester 2013 because the Columbia School District hasn't made the decision to fund the program for 2013. PedNet sent this announcement about the situation:

We had planned to begin our Walking School Bus fall program this coming Monday, Sept 16.  However, earlier this week the Columbia Public School Board (CPS) was unable to come to a decision on whether to include the Walking School Bus in their budget and tabled the issue.

Unfortunately, because of the critical timing of this decision, in that WSB was scheduled to start this coming Monday, we have made the decision to postpone the WSB for the fall semester. We will continue negotiating with CPS over the next couple months and hope to have a revised contract for the Board of Education to approve at the October or November Board meeting, but any contract would be only for the spring semester. Unfortunately, there will be no Walking School Bus this fall.

Please continue to advocate to the Board of Education on our behalf to support negotations with us and come to an agreement with us so the WSB can continue next semester. You can email all the Board of Education members at the same time by clicking on the link here.

Given the multiple millions of dollars school districts around the state spend in student transportation funding, it is especially disappointing that the Columbia School District can't find the money to fund the Walking School Bus program.  The Walking School Bus program costs a small fraction of the amount spent on school busing--both in total and per student transported--while demonstrating some really powerful positive benefits.