School security expert Ken Trump blogs that a two-day "bullying summit" held this week in Washington, D.C., is resulting in a new federal position that will really hold school districts' feet to the fire when it comes to how they report and respond to the national epidemic plaguing the nation's students. Education Secretary Arne Duncan called bullying a "gateway to hate" that he wants to close by using federal civil rights laws to investigate specific harassment or bullying incidents.

This is big news for all educators, and this most certainly includes school bus drivers and other transportation personnel. Earlier this summer, Assistant Deputy Secretary for Safe and Drug Free Schools Kevin Jennings appeared in an NAPT webinar that discussed student bullying on board the school bus and how the industry must go about reporting any and all cases. In fact, Jennings went so far as linking the school bus to the classroom.

Just this week, the American School Bus Council during it's annual summit in Chicago pointed to Jennings as one of the first real advocates for school busing that the industry has known in the Department of Education. So it's no leap to conclude that school bus operators should sit up and take notice at the latest federal stance.

Meanwhile, during the federal bullying summit, Jennings also introduced Russlyn Ali, the assistant secretary for the Office of Civil Rights, as the "new Sheriff in town" when it comes to battling this ongoing problem. Ali said that the Office of Civil Rights, which she admitted had “not been as active as it should have been” in taking the bullying issue head on is embarking on changing its role. Going forward, OCR will be "vigorously” enforcing civil rights laws and will be “proactively investigating school districts” when any and all claims surface. This means the feds are finely tuned on acquiring better data to "paint a better portrait and more accurate portrait" of harassment.

Specifically, Trump opines that schools should expect the Obama Administration to push for mandatory data collection while possibly seeking new federal anti-bullying laws "with a civil rights theme." This would all lead to more investigations of civil rights complaints against schools and, here's the catcher, possible federal school safety funding "skewed" toward bullying. Trump also voices some concerns, which I also suggest you read.

Still, with momentum coming out of this week's ASBC Summit and key relationships, or at least connections, made over the past several months in D.C. between the school bus industry and key administration people like Jennings, there is much hope that school buses are better poised to piggy-back on federal programs to secure some additional funding by successfully making the case that the school bus is an extension of the classroom. And in as much, school bus operations, at least on some level, not only deserve but desperately need more federal attention when trying to improve the education as well as safety of school children everywhere.