WILLEMSTAD.- Yesterday was a big day for school bus drivers, when they signed an agreement with the Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sports, Mrs. Marilyn Alcalá-Wallé. It is an official contract for bus drivers. After more than 10 years without enjoying security, a new contract for the school transport drivers was made official thanks to the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport in cooperation with their union SITEK, finally giving satisfactory completion to the arrival of this great historic day.
Bus drivers of school buses already have their working conditions established in writing, so they also have security in their jobs. In turn, this agreement brought security and transparency. Each contract indicates how much and which driver is responsible for transporting which child. For these reasons indicated above, it is very important for the Government to formally conclude an annual agreement with the drivers.
For the rest, it is vital for school bus drivers to be aware of their important roles in the field of education. Once the student enters the bus, he will be under the care of the Government. In this case, drivers are co-responsible to take care and look after children from school to their homes, talk with them during the journey and vice versa.
School transport is an important condition to be able to achieve the fundamental right to education, and in this way together, achieve the goal of a well-formed community in accordance with the Governing Agreement.
On behalf of SITEK, its chairman Mr. Darius “Lio” Plantijn, thanked the Minister Marilyn Alcalá-Wallé for her collaboration in the realization of this historic event, for some years the drivers did not sign their respective contracts and this obviously left the drivers mired in certain doubts. “Once they have their contracts signed, the Government recognizes them as Professionals.”
Later Plantijn said that they were all professionals who looked after the children and when they are controlled by the police or request some bond, the contract signed with the Government allows them to demonstrate that they exercise a serious function as school bus drivers. This is the first phase they want to do for school transportation, sign a previous contract and then give training.
Mr. Zimmerman will provide training to school bus drivers so that they can elevate their decent work duties. Plantijn said that after this he hopes to be able to work on school transportation plan also. A mix between school transport work and public transport as well. And this will come in two phases, so I finish expressing the sr. Plantijn.
