Title page for ETD etd-101797-152222

Type of Document

Dissertation

Author

Crews, James O

Author's Email Address

jacrews@vt.edu

URN

etd-101797-152222

Title

Virginia School Bus Driver Training: Does Training Program Adequacy Affect school Bus Accident Rates?

Degree

Doctor of Education

Department

Educational Administration

Advisory Committee

Advisor Name	Title
Salmon, Richard G.	Committee Chair
Carlton, Patrick W.	Committee Member
Fortune, Jimmie C.	Committee Member
Goodman, Barbara V.	Committee Member
Morgan, Samuel D.	Committee Member

Keywords

none provided

Date of Defense

1997-08-01

Availability

unrestricted

Abstract

Analysis of data provided by the Virginia Departments of Motor Vehicles, Transportation,
and Education all show school buses as having a significantly higher number of accidents per
hundred million miles of travel than other forms of transportation. Such statistics are alarming
and formal study of school bus accident factors has been limited. The purposes of this study
were to (a) establish the adequacy of the school bus driver training programs of Local
Education Agencies(LEAs) of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and (b) assess the results of
various training programs on the reduction of school bus accidents.
Descriptive data were gathered using two surveys. The driver survey included items
regarding driver training and accident history. In addition, the survey included driver history,
driver demographics, and inquiries into the adequacy of training preparation for the Commercial
Drivers License(CDL). The transportation directors survey included items regarding training
topics, training methods, program description, and employer expectations. Other topics
included were the impact of the CDL, and government mandated training programs. Data
analysis was conducted by developing cross-tabulation matrices, chi square tests of significance,
correlation coefficients, paired t-tests, and multifactor analysis of variance (ANOVA).
Conclusions formulated from this study include: (a) training programs in many LEAs do
not meet national standards for adequacy; (b) there is no direct relationship between the number
of school bus accidents and the adequacy of the training program; (c) there are few LEAs that
analyze accident statistics to make modifications to training programs; and (d) most LEAs use
the Virginia School Bus Driver Curriculum Guide as their major training resource. Findings such
as these provided beneficial data to the Virginia Department of Education, LEA officials, and
directors of transportation on training modification and effectiveness, as well as accident
reduction.

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