ALT-5 Should School Buses have and Enforce Seat Belt use – Yes
Should school buses have and enforce seat belt use? This is a question I always enjoyed discussing because I'm a firm believer seat belts should be mandatory for every bus regardless whether it is a school bus or a bus used for fares. I know when I attended school way back when, many of us had to stand up on the bus in the aisle and hold unto someone's seat to keep from being pitched forward into the floor and it was almost an impossibility to hold on when the bus went around a bend of came to a screechy halt. This was dangerous back in the 50's and it is dangerous today. Can you imagine what could have happened to all of us students who were standing in the aisle if we had gone over an embankment. I would hate to imagine the number of students that could have been killed.
Seat belts should be installed in every school bus and it should be mandatory that every child's seat belt is locked into place before the bus moves forward. There should be a sensor to alert the driver when all seat belts are securely snapped into its appropriate position before the bus is allowed to move forward. If one of the students unsnaps their seat belt the sensor should go off to alert the driver. When you think about it, a bus driver is responsible for all the children's lives on his/her bus and every precautionary measure should be taken for the safety of our children.
The lives of our children are precious and we must protect them as much as possible. I believe every parent should stand up and vote for the installation of seats belts in every school bus and in every town in the United States. It's going to be too late when a large group of children are killed when a bus goes over an embankment. It has been proven that seat belts do save lives and if a bus should take a tumble over a hill, the children who are in their seat belts have a better chance of living.
Many people say, "Oh, children could get hung in a seat belt; yes, they could but if they are taught how to snap the seat belt into place and to unsnap it the odds are likely the seat belt will release and allow the children to free themselves. I would rather have my child in a seat belt than for them to have "no" protection at all. Parent's and Teacher's should fight for the right to have seat belts installed to protect their precious children from harm.
If seat belts are mandatory for automobiles, they should be mandatory for school buses and commercial fare buses. Let's get the word out to everyone to demand seat belts in our children's school buses.
