Durham School Services

Happy Friday and Happy last day of Love the Bus Month! On this last day of Love the Bus, we’re spotlighting another one of our many incredible teams throughout the U.S. This time, the limelight is on our team in St. Helens, OR. What a lovely group of team members! Although Love the Bus Month is officially over after today, here at Durham, showing appreciation for our team members never stops! We’ll continue to showcase our amazing team members and all the fantastic work they do to ensure our students get to school safely each and every day. Thank you for your dedication and commitment. We are truly lucky to have all of you part of our team. ??

Our last team member spotlight for Black History Month is on Bryan Denney, Sr., who is a Senior Accounts Receivable Tech who is part of our corporate team in Lisle, IL. Bryan fondly shared that his favorite moment in Black History was “when my mom called me out of school so we could watch the Million Man March on TV. I was 10 years old at the time and that was the largest gathering of black people I had ever seen live. That was the first time I "felt" like an African American. It's one thing to be told you are something, but now I was "part" of something. Even if just through the television set, I felt like I belonged.” Thank you, Bryan, and all of our other team members for sharing their stories in celebration of Black History Month. Also, thank you to everyone who joined us for these spotlights.

When someone is wheelie awesome, you just need to let them know! In San Bernardino, CA, one of Driver Gwendolyn’s students gave her a lovely card to show their appreciation in honor of Love the Bus month. February is truly the sweetest month for our team members!

As Black History Month comes to an end soon, we have two more team member spotlights to share. Our first one of the day features Leslie Dowdy, Diesel Technician in Memphis, TN. As a Black History Month tradition, Leslie likes to watch “documentaries of the ones who lost their lives in the fight for equality for not just black people, but all people” and names their favorite moment in Black History as when emancipation was proclaimed.

??? Compton Unified Rolls Out 25 New Electric School Buses! ??? ? Big news! Compton Unified School District (CUSD) has unveiled its first-ever fleet of 25 electric school buses, bringing clean, green transportation to our students! ???? These buses will hit the road this spring, reducing emissions and promoting a healthier future. ? At today’s ribbon-cutting, CUSD leaders, partners like Highland Electric Fleets, Durham School Services, Southern California Edison (SCE) and Thomas Built Buses and community members celebrated this milestone. And there’s more to come—CUSD has secured funding for 25 more EV buses! ?? ? Thank you to all who came out and supported today! Read more: https://bit.ly/4hUSF0y #ComptonUnified #SustainableCompton #EVBuses #InnovationInEducation #ComptonScholars

Thank you to everyone who came out today to celebrate COMPTON UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT's (CUSD) new fleet of 25 EV school buses, which will be officially rolling out this spring. Attendees of the event included Lillie P. Darden (Councilwoman - District 4), Hector De La Torre (Executive Director, Gateway Cities Council of Governments), CUSD Superintendent Dr. Darin Brawley, CUSD Chief Administrative Officer Dr. Shannon Soto, CUSD Board Members Sandra Moss, Alma Taylor-Pleasant, and Satra Zurita, as well as key partners Highland Electric Fleets and Thomas Built Buses, Southern California Edison (SCE), and our amazing Compton team and community members. Durham’s CEO, Tim Wertner, was in attendance and provided remarks praising our local team for the hard work and efforts they put into making the project a success and emphasized the importance of early adopters of electric vehicle (EV) initiatives like CUSD, who jump-started their EV transition through funds provided by the EPA’s Clean School Bus Program. In mentioning the EPA program, Tim also further stressed the importance of having “our partners in government, at the state and federal level, to continue to support this early transition with additional grant money for school districts and their transportation partners that are ready to deliver and operate zero emission buses today.” As a Company dedicated to serving their communities and advocates of sustainability, we are extremely proud of the strides we are making with our school district partners in the EV sphere and how these initiatives demonstrate our values and commitment to ensuring our students and communities are safe, healthy, and can continue to thrive. We look forward to seeing the school buses hit the road this spring and hope you will continue to join us in celebrating CUSD’s EV journey. https://bit.ly/4ifPPTE #ElectricVehicles #Sustainability #CUSD #CleanEnergy #EVInitiative #EV

In honor of Love the Bus, students from Crosby Elementary shared their appreciation for our Harvard, IL drivers with a sweet surprise -- an abundance of beautiful homemade Valetine’s Day cards! “We’re super blessed to have received these cards”, said Safety and Training Supervisor Kristie Gesture. “Sometimes all you need is a kind gesture.”

As we continue to celebrate and recognize our team members for Love the Bus Month, we’d like to share an incredible act of heroism that recently occurred at our Duval County, FL, location. On what seemed like a typical day for Driver Pat King turned into a day she and her bus monitor will never forget when the monitor suddenly fell unconscious and Pat sprung into action to perform life-saving CPR. Thanks to Pat’s quick thinking and recall of the safety and CPR training she received from Durham, she was able to put her CPR skills to use until paramedics arrived. To honor her, Pat was presented with the Durham School Services Front Line Hero Award and a bouquet of flowers in front of her peers this morning. Pat was also featured and interviewed by local news channel, Action News. We are so very proud and honored to have Pat on our team and are happy we are able to very fittingly recognize her during Love the Bus Month. https://ow.ly/25h450V6vAL

Our second spotlight of the day is on Dallas Newton, Recruiting Coordinator in Raymond, MS, who proudly shared that her home state of Mississippi is the birthplace of Blues music and famous Blues singer B.B. King. Dallas also shared that southern cooking is a tradition for her family, and for holidays and Sundays, she loves to come together with her family to enjoy good cooking, football, laughter, and dancing.

As the heart of our company, team members in North Providence, RI, were treated to a delicious and impressive spread of sweets and hot chocolate in celebration of Valentine’s Day!