For the first time on record, the iconic yellow school bus is no longer the primary way of transportation for students across the nation, writes Andrew Van Dam for The Washington Post.

According to the National Household Travel Survey, in 2022, 53 percent of all students nationwide were getting dropped off at school or driving themselves. The need to drop off children at school has been weighing on parents, who sometimes have to spend hours in school pickup lines.

One of the main reasons for the shift is the shortage of school bus drivers. This has forced some schools to slash their bus service, change hours, and cancel days. They are now even paying parents to drive their kids to school.

A program that started in 2020 has Philadelphia pay parents $300 a month, or $3,000 per household for transportation of their kids.

Four years since its inception, the program includes 16,000 students, which is not far below the 23,000 students who use school buses. However, that number is still significantly lower than the 55,000 students who rely on public transit fare cards.

“I believe the bus is a lifeline for students,” said Michael Gottfried, an applied economist at the University of Pennsylvania.

Read more about the school bus issue facing students and parents at The Washington Post.

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