DUBAI //Experts from around the world gathered in Dubai yesterday for the start of a three-day conference on improving school-bus safety, accessibility and standards.
The prevention of bullying on vehicles and the need to accommodate children with special needs were among the topics to be discussed.
The conference was jointly organised by the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) and the US National Association of Pupil Transport.
"Between 2005 and 2009, we saw a decline in the number of pupils using school buses," Essa Al Dosari, a public transportation expert and former chief executive of RTA's Public Transport Agency, told the audience during his opening speech.
"This was due to the public's lack of confidence in the school transport system. We had buses that would transport labourers at dawn then go and pick up students, and some buses didn't even have a central aisle - you had to climb over the chairs. Can you imagine how dangerous this would be in an accident?
"Over the course of one year we completely reformed the school transport system and set clear regulations. Over the next three years, accidents fell by 63 per cent, which is a huge number. Now we are seeing an annual rise of 5.5 per cent in students opting for school buses."
Such challenges were not unique to the UAE, experts said.
"In Washington we have about a million students, 10,000 buses and 11,000 bus drivers," said Randy Dorn, the superintendent of the US state's public education agency.
"It takes great skills to be able to handle a vehicle on the freeway and through traffic with 50 kids behind you, and making sure they are safe and there is no bullying or other issues," he said.
The concept of public school buses is relatively new in China, according to Dr Jiao Chengwu, the chief engineer at the Research Institute of Highway in Beijing.
"There was no regulation of school buses before 2011," said Dr Chengwu, who showed the audience a photograph of a child leaping from a moving bus. "Some drivers wouldn't even stop - it was a common occurrence in rural areas for children to jump out of the window while the bus was still moving."
The government only acted to implement stricter regulations after 20 children were killed in a 2011 Gansu bus accident, he said.
The conference continues today at the Dubai World Trade Centre with seminars on safety, technology, student management, and the challenges in managing people with special needs, as well as a special training workshop for bus drivers and supervisors.
malkhan@thenational.ae
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
'Young girls thinking of big ideas'
Words come easy for aspiring writer Afra Al Muhairb. The business side of books, on the other hand, is entirely foreign to the 16-year-old Emirati. So, she followed her father’s advice and enroled in the Abu Dhabi Education Council’s summer entrepreneurship course at Abu Dhabi University hoping to pick up a few new skills.
“Most of us have this dream of opening a business,” said Afra, referring to her peers are “young girls thinking of big ideas.”
In the three-week class, pupils are challenged to come up with a business and develop an operational and marketing plan to support their idea. But, the learning goes far beyond sales and branding, said teacher Sonia Elhaj.
“It’s not only about starting up a business, it’s all the meta skills that goes with it -- building self confidence, communication,” said Ms Elhaj. “It’s a way to coach them and to harness ideas and to allow them to be creative. They are really hungry to do this and be heard. They are so happy to be actually doing something, to be engaged in creating something new, not only sitting and listening and getting new information and new knowledge. Now they are applying that knowledge.”
Afra’s team decided to focus their business idea on a restaurant modelled after the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Each level would have a different international cuisine and all the meat would be halal. The pupils thought of this after discussing a common problem they face when travelling abroad.
“Sometimes we find the struggle of finding halal food, so we just eat fish and cheese, so it’s hard for us to spend 20 days with fish and cheese,” said Afra. “So we made this tower so every person who comes – from Africa, from America – they will find the right food to eat.”
rpennington@thenational.ae
'The Predator'
Dir: Shane Black
Starring: Olivia Munn, Boyd Holbrook, Keegan-Michael Key
Two and a half stars
TECH%20SPECS%3A%20APPLE%20WATCH%20SE%20(second%20generation)
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