Nearly 4,000 children included in lawsuit against DC over reliable school buses

A federal judge has allowed a lawsuit against D.C.'s Office of the State Superintendent of Education to proceed, filed by parents who claim the office has failed to provide safe and reliable school bus transportation for children with disabilities. Parents describe instances of children being hours late to school, missing medication, and experiencing negative impacts on their health and mood. Elizabeth Daggett, a mother of a non-verbal 15-year-old son, shared her frustration with the unreliable system, stating she has “no idea where he is or when he's going to be here.” Attorney Kathy Zeisel noted this is the first lawsuit since 2012 attempting to fix the entire system, after a previous lawsuit from 1996-2012. The lawsuit focuses on approximately 4,000 students with disabilities out of D.C.’s 100,000 students. The plaintiffs are seeking a modernization of the transportation system, specifically a switch from paper-based tracking to a computer system with GPS tracking for buses, allowing parents to monitor their child’s bus location. OSSE reports a 91% on-time performance rate and is implementing GPS tracking on all buses, with a parent-facing app planned for launch.

(Source：WJLA)