PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Maggie Sanchez, Member of Citywide Council on Special Education
4:21:07
·
3 min
Maggie Sanchez, speaking in her personal capacity as a parent of a child with a disability, shared her experiences with school bus transportation issues. She highlighted problems with obtaining NICSA accounts, discrimination in OmniCard distribution, and the need for better communication between families and transportation staff.
- Emphasized difficulties in obtaining NICSA accounts due to communication gaps between DOE and schools
- Argued that excluding students with transportation on their IEPs from receiving OmniCards is discriminatory
- Advocated for providing school transportation staff with work phones to improve direct communication with families
- Stressed the importance of fair wages for transportation staff to improve recruitment and retention
Maggie Sanchez
4:21:07
Hello.
4:21:08
Hello.
4:21:08
How are you?
4:21:10
My name is Maggie Sanchez.
4:21:14
I sorry.
4:21:17
My name is Maggie Sanchez.
4:21:19
I am the I am a member of the citywide council on special education, but I will be speaking here on my personal capacity.
4:21:30
As a parent of a child with a disability who's received the busting for many years now, the a lot of the experiences that have been pointed out here in in other testimonies is one that I've I share.
4:21:47
And there one of the issues personally that I've come across is getting a NICSA account.
4:21:59
There is a lot of lack of communication between the the near public the department of education and student schools, 853 schools, or 4410 schools on how how the process goes for getting that access code that many of the families need.
4:22:23
The access codes don't come from the schools.
4:22:25
They come from the from the districts or the DOE itself, and also having to being able to fix whatever issues, whether it's the wrong address in the in the in the system, in the in the computer system, or whether it's, you know, birth date or name, and that creates a barrier for getting a NICSA account as well.
4:22:51
On omnicards, it is discriminatory to exclude students with this with transportation on their IEPs from receiving these cards that are available to all other students, considering the level of busing issues that we've stated here.
4:23:08
On the regarding the the emergency contacts for for school staff, school transportation staff should be provided a war phone since the the one to one contact between families and staff is critical or clerically critically important to continue because, you know, students with disabilities things happen on the bus, and, you know, we we can go through loopholes to reach out the staff or, you know, or or to resolve those issues.
4:23:45
As you've heard, bus companies a lot at the times, they're not responsive.
4:23:50
OPT is not able to disclose a lot of the information to us of the families, like the route information and stuff like that, or the the timing of the bot or things like that that the bus will arrive.
4:24:04
So That's important to consider.
4:24:07
You know, they they are transporting our precious cargo, which is our kids.
4:24:13
So that's one of the points that I would like to to make to be considered.
4:24:19
FAIR WAGES FOR TRANSPORTATION STAFF HAS TO BE THE KEY.
4:24:24
IS THE KEY TO RECRUITING AND
UNKNOWN
4:24:28
Reporter: THANK YOU.
4:24:28
THE CHEST MORNING OF YOUR TIMES EXpired.
Maggie Sanchez
4:24:31
THANK YOU.
