Executive Summary

This study examined official reports filed by 611 school districts in Ohio over the five-year period between 1994 and 1998. The study contained several interesting findings:

• Although use of private contractors grew over the period, the vast majority of Ohio districts continue to provide transportation in-house. Less than 5 percent of pupils were transported by contractors and less than 3 percent of districts relied primarily on contractors in the final year of the analysis.


• The median district that contracted out its pupil transportation paid significantly more than the median district that kept its program in-house, measured in two different ways. The median contracting district paid between 24 percent and 50 percent more per pupil over the course of the five-year analysis.


• The differences in per-mile costs were even greater, ranging between 51 percent and 63 percent at the median during the five years of analysis.


• Those districts that used a mix of public and private transportation tended to transport only a small percentage of their students with private contractors, often primarily those who attended private schools. Differences between partial contracting districts and those who provided all transportation in-house were negligible.


• Contracting districts tended to be larger both in terms of miles driven and number of children bused than non-contracting districts. Further, districts that used contracting were concentrated geographically in the southwest region of the state.


• School districts that rely exclusively on contractors bear a higher percentage of their transportation operating costs than districts that provide services in-house, because they receive a lower percentage of their overall costs back from the state in reimbursements.

These findings have important implications for Ohio school districts trying to find the most economical way of transporting children to school.