The Southern Westchester BOCES Board of Education met via videoconference June 9, 2021. The meeting was livestreamed at our Virtual Board Meeting page. A link to the recording with accompanying transcript will be posted at our Board Meetings Archive. For meeting agendas, visit our Board Docs site.
We are happy to announce that the 2021-22 Southern Westchester BOCES Services Guide has been published. The Services Guide details the range of cooperative services available to component district schools in the coming school year. These services are developed in collaboration with our district partners and are designed with student needs and district goals and missions in mind. The Services Guide will be shipped to component district offices soon. As usual, a digitally accessible version is posted at SWBOCES.org under the Our Districts menu as well as attached to this announcement. We encourage you to peruse these pages and learn all about how SWBOCES works to support all our students and schools in ways that are effective and cost-efficient.
Contact: Stephen Tibbetts
914-937-3820
stibbetts@swboces.org
The SWBOCES Transportation Department consists of Automotive Service Excellence-certified mechanics providing all vehicle maintenance to meet district needs. Services include preventative maintenance, necessary repairs and inspection services. The New York State Department of Transportation inspects each vehicle twice a year, and the passing rate for our vehicles is exemplary, with all earning scores of 95 to 100 percent. In addition, the Transportation Department provides private bus company consortium management for participating districts and mandated professional development and training for drivers and monitors of district based operations.
SWBOCES manages contract transportation consortium programs for participating local school districts from a satellite transportation office. The consortium program currently includes the BEPT Consortium for students in the Bronxville, Eastchester, Pelham, Tuckahoe and New Rochelle school districts and the MVP Consortium for students in the Mount Pleasant, Valhalla and Pleasantville school districts. Since the inception of consortium management, SWBOCES has reduced transportation costs for districts by sharing busing among districts while maintaining safe, efficient and reliable service by private bus companies. The consortium office relies on routing software to guide operations and provide up-to-date reports to schools, parents and bus companies. Years of experience with Westchester County schools and ongoing professional development enable efficient and effective performance from the consortium transportation office.
Cooperative school bus and vehicle maintenance services are available to any district requiring assistance with fleet maintenance (bus or any other vehicles). Fleet maintenance and inspection services are provided by an experienced team of qualified, efficient technicians at the SWBOCES garage at the Rye Lake Campus in North White Plains. BOCES’s DOT inspection rates for other districts’ fleets range between 95 and 100 percent. SWBOCES mechanics have been commended frequently by NYS DOT and the New York Association for Pupil Transportation for conducting one of the top school bus maintenance programs in the state. Loaner vans are available for school districts to cover a temporary shortage of vehicles.
