Some junior high students across Davis County arrived at school 20 minutes early Wednesday, Aug. 19, as the district's bus driver shortage forced a workaround on the first day of the 2026-27 school year.
Davis School District is running "double back" routes at some schools, where a single bus picks up one group of students, drops them off early, then returns for a second group. Early drop-off buses arrive between 7:35 and 7:40 a.m. at junior high schools that normally start at 8 a.m.
Transportation director Jake Heidrich told the Davis School Board on Tuesday, Aug. 18, that double-back routes exist purely because the district lacks enough drivers to cover every route individually. The district's 241 buses carry 21,000 students and log 2.5 million miles a year. Heidrich did not specify how many routes are doubled up or which schools are affected, but the transportation center where buses stage is located near Farmington High School, according to the Davis Journal.
The district is hiring.
Why drivers leave
The retention problem comes down to the job's structure. Drivers work roughly 2.5 to 3 hours in the morning, sit through a five-hour unpaid break, then work another 2.5 to 3 hours in the afternoon. If a route loses students and a driver's hours drop, they can lose benefits entirely.
"No other job in our district is like that," assistant superintendent and business administrator Tim Leffel told the board. "We have drivers that are on the route and then they lose students on a route and their hours go down and now I don't have benefits anymore."
The district is restructuring internally to improve retention, including letting drivers bid for time blocks based on seniority.
Tablets instead of a new bus
Rather than purchase an additional bus, the district is equipping its fleet with navigation tablets that provide turn-by-turn directions for new and substitute drivers. Fifty tablets were piloted on special education routes in spring 2026, with 89 added in May and 105 more in July. Full deployment of 244 tablets is planned by January 2027.
Heidrich said driver feedback has been enthusiastic, with drivers asking for theirs faster than the rollout can keep up.
Students on the first double-back route each day are also the first picked up for the trip home. Students on the second route wait at school for the bus to return. The district has not announced a timeline for resolving the shortage.
