ASHLAND — School bus drivers are in a unique position, according to Greg Truhan.
Truhan, a retired Secret Service agent and trainer with START, or School Transportation Active-Threat Response Training, told Ashland City Schools’ bus drivers Friday they’re the first and last person to see students each day.
They also have students who ride on their bus over a number of years.
Those two factors, Truhan said, make bus drivers an important part of threat response in schools. Bus drivers can play a role observing changes in student behavior.
Observing those changes and reaching out about it could stop school safety threats from being carried out, Truhan said.
The training Truhan and START offered for Ashland City Schools’ bus drivers spanned the whole day Friday.
Drivers watched several videos and received tips on what types of changes in student behavior they should watch out for. They also received hands-on training.
Bus drivers boarded a school bus with START trainers and walked through plans and best practices for handling several different scenarios — from aggressive parents to an active shooter on the bus.
“It’s all about bringing our kids home alive,” trainers said throughout the day.
‘Best training I’ve ever been to’
Doug Shipper, Ashland City Schools’ transportation director, said he attended a START training last year at Hillsdale Local Schools.
“In 23 years of being a transportation supervisor, this is the best training I’ve ever been to,” Shipper said.
School Bus START, the program that offers the training, was founded by James R. Levine, the CEO of Levine Security Solutions. It’s based in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. According to START’s website, the idea came about from Levine’s own experiences as a school resource officer.
The program now employs a team of “active-duty and former police officers, social workers, mental health experts, United States military and United States Secret Service personnel.” They work to impart several learning objectives, including:
- Situational and threat awareness
- Emergency response basics
- Introduction to active threat response
- Crisis intervention training
- Identifying suspicious items
- Dealing with physical altercations
Shipper said the district paid for the training with a safety grant, and it came with a price tag of between $9,000 and $10,000. He wished every district could go through the training, but the cost could be prohibitive.
The need
Still, Shipper said he felt it important to bring the training to Ashland City Schools, especially with “the situation around the country.”
As of Sept. 19, according to CNN, there had been 50 school shootings in 2024.
A Center for Homeland Defense and Security database tracking school shootings in K-12 districts from 1970 to June 2022 also showed several incidents that had happened at a school bus.
The incidents tracked weren’t only mass shootings, but rather followed any time a gun is brandished, fired, or a bullet hits school property for any reason.
Shipper said he thought Ashland City Schools’ bus drivers were well-prepared to handle those situations. Still, training enhances that preparation, and Shipper said the district is always looking for ways to do that.
For bus drivers, like Kimberly Chance, the training offered a better ability to understand the threat.
Chance, who’s been an Ashland City Schools bus driver for 19 years, agreed with Shipper that every district should have to go through the training.
Chance said the training instilled an extra level of safety, so she knows how to handle a variety of situations.
“(Students) are already safe on our buses, but this makes them safer,” Shipper said.