National School Bus Safety Week October 22-26

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The National Academy of Sciences, the U.S. Department of Transportation and other authorities agree that school buses are the safest form of transportation for getting children to and from school. Some 475,000 school buses carry 25 million children, more than half of America’s schoolchildren, each day, rarely with any serious accident.
School bus drivers are highly trained professionals who have your child’s safety in mind. They receive specialized training in student behavior management, loading and unloading, security and emergency medical procedures.
Just how safe are school buses, even without seat belts?
School buses are the safest way for children to get to and from school, outperforming any other mode of transportation on the road-15 times safer than other types of transportation (combined) to and from school, including riding with an adult, walking or riding a bike.
Teens driving themselves to school and children riding with a teenage driver are 44 times more likely to be fatally injured than if they were on a school bus. (Source: Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Committee on School Transportation Safety, “The Relative Risks of School Travel: A National Perspective and Guidance for Local Community Risk Assessment,” 2002; http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/sr/sr269.pdf – See table in appendix).
Utah School Bus Safety:
In Utah 1,904 to and from school buses transport 167,070 students to and from school, for 60,145,200 student trips annually over 26,483,116 miles. Utah has an excellent safety record with few incidents and injuries. Fatalities related to school bus transportation in Utah are extremely rare. National statistics indicate that of the approximate 25,000,000 students who do not ride school buses to and from school, about 800 will loose their lives on their way to or from school each year. For every 31,250 students who do not ride school buses to and from school each year, one will likely become a fatality.
It is estimated that five lives are saved each year with the students that are transported to and from school on Utah school buses. It is also estimated that of the approximate 330,000 students who do not ride Utah school buses to and from school, about ten will become fatalities while on the way to or from school each year.