Times of great upheaval also offer the opportunity for great innovation. Our K-12 schools have certainly faced their share of upheaval in the last two years. From remote learning to staffing shortages, our education system has been challenged on nearly every front.

While schools are now returning to normal, one area that districts continue to struggle with is a significant shortage of bus drivers. Across the state, districts are reporting bus driver shortages ranging from 15% to a stunning 40% of jobs that are vacant.

Skyrocketing fuel costs have compounded the challenges with high gas prices squeezing transportation budgets.

As a result, school districts have been forced to consolidate bus routes, leading to fewer stops and longer routes. That has had an enormous impact on students that were already disadvantaged and underserved.

Rather than stand idly by while schools struggle to get kids to school, we need to give our school districts the ability to innovate and adapt as we recover from the pandemic.

That is why we have introduced bipartisan legislation, HB22-1395, to provide grants to school districts across the state to create innovation solutions to their transportation challenges.

This is not the state government imposing a one-size-fits-all solution on local school districts. We have an incredibly diverse state with incredibly diverse needs and challenges, and so any effective solution must be created at the local level.

In Greeley, for example, we have world-class career and technical training programs in our high schools, from Greeley Central High School’s advanced manufacturing program to construction classes at Greeley West and Jefferson High Schools. Next year, students from across the district will be able to attend pre-engineering classes at the world-class Tointon Academy. But if kids don’t have transportation, they miss out on these potentially life-changing opportunities.

We need to empower local school districts in Greeley to create transportation solutions that can ensure every kid can attend the program that best fits their needs, regardless of their parent’s ability to drive them.

Likewise, in Jefferson County, students across the district can attend top-of-line career-connected learning programs at either of our Warren Tech campuses. But in most cases, students and families must provide their own transportation to and from Warren Tech, which creates inequitable access. Our bipartisan bill will empower districts like Jefferson County to create innovative transportation solutions to give more kids access to the school and programs that best fit them and their academic and professional goals.

Some potential innovative solutions could include, but aren’t limited to, efforts to retain and attract bus drivers, increasing collaboration between school districts to get students to career-connected opportunities, the creation of ride-share and carpool programs, or partnerships with local public transit authorities to provide fare stipends to students. It will be up to each district to determine what the best solution is to their unique challenges.

In southern Colorado, both families and teachers often drive long distances to get to school. Our legislation could allow rural school districts to hire teachers to transport students that live near them, helping put extra money in underpaid teachers’ pockets and reducing burdens on families at the same time. With gas prices burdening budgets in every corner of Colorado, this solution is common sense.

Our legislation puts the trust in the hands of local leaders that know their respective student populations best and gives them the power to innovate and drive locally-led solutions.

An effective school transportation system is not just one that gets kids to and from school every day. High school students also need transportation to off-site learning opportunities like internships, apprenticeships and other educational programming not based in their main school building.

To build the workforce of tomorrow, we need to help our kids access the best learning opportunities today.

Our bill does not create a new government program, but rather gives school districts the power and resources to begin to modernize and update their existing systems of school transportation to better meet family and student needs. In Colorado, with 178 school districts facing an array of unique challenges, a smartly designed system would be created from the ground up, with each district given flexibility to use their dollars locally to best serve their students.

Let’s invest in the resourcefulness and expertise of our local education leaders and give them the ability to create forward-looking solutions that will help better align school transportation systems to the needs of all kids and families.

Colin Larson, R-Littleton, represents District 2 in the Colorado House. Mary Young, D-Greeley, represents District 50 in the Colorado House. Both serve on the House Education Committee. Cleave Simpson, R-Alamosa, represents District 35 in the Colorado Senate.