Many changes have occurred for Wesleyan within the past year like the new school store and the new student lounge, and now there is an even bigger change in Wesleyan’s near future—the new bus system. This new bus system will affect around 130 of Wesleyan’s students next year. There has been an outstanding level of interest and response to this new bus system. When Wesleyan sent out a survey to current and prospective parents, 92 current students and 36 prospective students were interested in riding the bus.
This will be a morning bus service only, and they will be using the Wesleyan mini-buses. A new aspect of this bus system is that the bus drivers will not be Wesleyan faculty like prior years; instead, the drivers will be “evaluated and hired by the school.” The cost for a student to be a part of this bus system is $500 per semester. Based on research, the predicted pick-up locations will be in Suwanee/Duluth, Johns Creek, Roswell, Dunwoody, Sandy Springs/Brookhaven, and Decatur/Stone Mountain. Although those locations are the predicted ones, ultimately the demand of the students who sign up to use the bus routes will make the final decision.
Headmaster Chris Cleveland and Director of Admissions Mari Beth King decided that they needed these buses because traffic in Atlanta is horrible especially during the rush hours, and this traffic is not getting any better and can be stressful for many families. Also the number of dual-working parent families and single-parent families is increasing within our community, and finding the time to get one’s children to school and get to work on time can be extremely difficult. According to Ms. King, many prospective families have also been asking about transportation, and it is becoming more important for them and their decision on what school to go to. Wesleyan is behind in the area of transportation, and it is trying to give prospective families as many reasons to choose Wesleyan as possible.
When asked about how she feels about the new bus system, King said, “We are very excited about this new initiative! By offering a bus service to current and prospective families, we are taking one more step to partner with parents in an effort to make their life less complicated.” Wesleyan hopes to help ease the stress of families, and help welcome new members to the school from many new parts of town through this bus system.
