KYLE, Texas – Each year, the Bill Loshbough Grand Champion award goes to the winner of the School Bus Driver International Safety Competition produced by the National School Transportation Association (NSTA). This year’s two-day event concluded over the weekend, and Brian Rickmann of Oregon’s Beaverton School District took home the honors.

Rickmann finished the event with a grand total of 694 points, which gave him a commanding lead in the Type D competition over second place winner James Hethcock of Colleyville Independent School District in Grapevine, Texas (571.53) and Kevin Beck of Salem-Keizer Public School District in Oregon (545.87).

For the title of Bill Loshbough Grand Champion across all categories, named for the Hall of Fame member of NSTA and the National Association for Pupil Transportation, the overall race was a little tighter. Rickmann’s 694 points bested the 628 points tallied by James Tiensvold of Dickson County School District in Tennessee in the Type A competition and the 624.67 points by Betty Nelson of Dean Transportation in Lansing, Michigan in Type C.

The 52nd edition of the School Bus Driver International Safety Competition took place in Uhland, Texas June 27 and 28 at the Hays Consolidated Independent School District transportation facility. The competition was sponsored by Beacon Mobility and hosted by the National School Transportation Association. Hays CISD has hosted the event since 2019, with no competition held 2020-2022 due to COVID-19. The site has proved to be the perfect fit for a competition of this sort, “This facility is really tailormade for a competition like this. As you can see, the spacing and just the layout is really helpful” said Curt Macysyn, NSTA’s executive director.

This year’s competition consisted of a total of 93 school bus drivers from 27 states and two Canadian provinces. In order to qualify for the international competition, each driver had to win their state, regional, or provincial competition, or be an NSTA Member Inclusion Driver.

Drivers were grouped by type, with 11 Type A (small bus) drivers, 30 Type D (conventional bus) drivers, and 52 Type C (transit bus) drivers. While drivers mainly competed with drivers in their classification, the Bill Loshbough Grand Champion was crowned to the driver with the most points overall.

The competition itself was split into two separate competitions: A CDL knowledge test, which took place Saturday, June 27, and the scored driving competition, which took place Sunday, June 29. An awards dinner followed.

The scored driving competition consisted of 10 different events along one continual course. Before driving the course, drivers toured the course by bus and received the details of each individual event.

The course started with student loading, followed by a railroad crossing, then a right-hand turn. It continued with the offset alley, which required drivers to shift to the left, right and back to the left without hitting any barriers.

After the offset alley, drivers completed a left-hand turn, which directed them to the straight-line test that required them to keep their right dual wheels within a straight line. Drivers then paralleled parked their buses and navigated the diminishing clearance.

The competitors then found themselves faced with what proved to be the toughest task of the day, the backup stall. The backup stall required drivers to back their buses into a tight stall and stop in a marked and measured parameter. Upon securing the buses, drivers were scored on the timing and accuracy. Drivers then needed to pull their bus forward out of the stall without hitting any obstacles and proceed to the final event of the competition: The stop line.

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Type A Results

Type C Results

Type D Results

Each event was scrutinized by a set of judges stationed along the course at their respective events. All judges were volunteers, many of which came from school districts or companies. To avoid conflicts of interest, judges stepped away from the course when a competitor represented the same school district or company.

David Jorgensen, transportation operations manager of Salem-Keizer Public Schools in Oregon, did just that, as one of his district’s drivers, Kevin Beck, not only qualified for the competition, but also placed third amongst Type D drivers. Jorgensen, who judged the backup stall, had no shortage of pleasantries when speaking about NSTA and the competition as a whole.

“It’s fun to be out here. It’s fun to meet people from other places. It’s fun to watch the skills of the drivers and it’s just fun. It’s really smooth. It’s a great facility, the weather has been nice,” he commented. “Drivers have been doing okay. I mean, we are one of the most challenging events on the course, so anytime someone does well, that feels really good.”

Not only did the competition prove to be enjoyable, it allowed bus drivers from across North America to enhance their safety knowledge and skills, something that can go a long way in ensuring the safety of students.

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