Van Drivers
The Ohio pre-service student transportation manual covers all materials required by law for transporting students in vehicles other than school buses. Authorized vehicles must be approved to transport students. The vehicle must be originally designed and constructed at the factory for nine or fewer passengers, not including the driver; it must have a rooftop sign marked "school transportation". The name of the school district, or the name of the contractor, if applicable, must be clearly marked on the side of the vehicle. The vehicle must be inspected by a qualified mechanic twice a year.
Information on initial certification, recertification and pre-employment requirements for drivers of school vans may be reviewed on this page.
View the Ohio School Van Driver training video.
Van Drivers Documents
Driver Qualifications
This page contains a chart that identifies the qualifications to be a school bus driver or school van driver in the State of Ohio. Personnel qualifications for bus and van drivers may also be reviewed in OAC 3301-83-06 and 3301-83-07.
- School Transportation Vehicle Driver Qualification Chart
- Blood Pressure Qualifications: Rule 3301-83-07 of the Administrative Code establishes physical qualifications for pupil transportation drivers, including parameters for blood pressure. This table summarizes the blood pressure information set forth in this rule:
| Blood Pressure |
Outcome |
Required retest |
Required retest |
| Less than 160/90 |
Passes BP test |
n/a |
n/a |
BP 161-180 diastolic
and/or 91-104 systolic |
Conditional pass
– follow up required |
90 day retest by T-8 physician – must be less than 160/90 or driver is disqualified |
6 month (from date of T-8) check by treating physician – must be less than 160/90 or driver is
disqualified |
| Greater than 180/104 |
Fails physical |
n/a |
n/a |
Related
Student safety during the transportation process is paramount. Revisions to Ohio law (
ORC 4511.76) authorized school districts to utilize vehicles originally designed for not more than nine passengers, not including the driver, to transport community and chartered nonpublic school students to and from regularly scheduled school sessions. With this expansion of options, it is vital that districts are properly verifying and recording pupil transportation drivers regardless of the type of vehicle being used for transportation. The information provided below will help districts ensure all their drivers are in compliance with Ohio law.
Ensuring Proper Reporting of Driver Qualifications
The Department maintains the School Foundation Payment System (SFPS), an online database that serves as a repository for school transportation driver information. Pertinent information and data documenting Driver Status (e.g., driver has a current pre-service training certificate) is centrally located in SFPS, which is accessible to public school districts, community schools, and contractors that employ or utilize school bus or motor van drivers.
The goal of SFPS is to verify that drivers transporting Ohio students are actively meeting all driver qualifications, including holding an active pre-service certificate of training completion. Districts and schools who utilize drivers can easily access driver records within SFPS to confirm their drivers are qualified. The ability to collect and access these data is imperative as Ohio law (
ORC 3327.10)
prohibits employing or contracting with unqualified bus or motor van drivers.
In addition to driver information, SFPS also collect information regarding vehicles used for student transportation. Ohio law (
ORC 4511.76) imposes criminal sanctions for the operation of non-conforming vehicles, so it is essential that this data be available in a centralized system. SFPS ensures that address information is accessible for State compliance purposes.
To gain access to SFPS, a user needs to have an
OH|ID Account, Department of Education Profile and an appropriate
OEDS Role. An OEDS organization is created by requesting an “IRN” - a six-digit Information Retrieval Number that uniquely identifies each organization that interacts with the Department.
reporting Driver Information in SFPS
Legislation was adopted in 2023 that revised ORC 4511.76 authorizing school districts to utilize vehicles originally designed for not more than nine passengers, not including the driver, to transport community and chartered nonpublic school students to and from regularly scheduled school sessions.
As the new school year begins, schools, districts, and contractors are interested in expanding the use of passenger vans. However, in doing so, gaps have emerged in the data entry related to individual van drivers within SFPS. The flowchart below captures this issue.
In the flowchart, there are are two different scenarios for reporting drivers in SFPS. In one scenarios drivers are employed by the district and in the other they are not. When drivers are employed by the district, they have a record in SFPS and this is where the report will be entered. In the second scenario, there is only a proper driver record in SFPS if the transportation contractor has an IRN and employee drivers. In situations where the transportation contractor does not obtain an IRN from the driver or hires contractors themselves, there is no proper record in SFPS.
Possible impacts for School Districts
The lack of centralized information to confirm
which individual drivers the district is using through a transportation contractor
poses a noncompliance risk to districts. For example, when a district contracts with a vendor that then subcontracts with individual drivers or secondary transportation companies, districts remain responsible for ensuring all drivers or subcontracted drivers are properly qualified. Under Ohio law, should a district utilize a van driver who does not meet requirements set forth in
ORC 3327.10, the district will be non-compliant with pupil transportation requirements.
ORC 3327.021 provides:
(B) The department of education and workforce shall monitor whether each city, local, or exempted village school district is out of compliance. If the department determines that a district is out of compliance, the department shall notify a school district that it is out of compliance. The first time a district receives notification of noncompliance, it shall create a corrective action plan and submit that plan to the department within one week of receiving notification of the department's determination. If a district is subsequently found to be out of compliance, the department shall withhold twenty-five per cent of the district's daily payment for student transportation under Chapter 3317. of the Revised Code, as computed by the department, for each day that the district is determined to be out of compliance, beginning with the first day after the district has submitted the corrective action plan. A district may be found out of compliance two more times within the same school year, with twenty-five per cent of its daily state transportation funding withheld for each day it is determined to be out of compliance.
The following are options for Districts to consider
in contracting with Transportation Contractors to help reduce the risk of noncompliance. These options are intended to ensure all drivers used by a District are captured in SFPS.
- Consider requiring that the Transportation Contractor provide a list of all individual drivers providing services to the District (including all subcontracted drivers) and provide confirmation that each driver meets Ohio qualifications. The District would then enter the driver’s information directly into SFPS.
- Consider requiring that the Transportation Contractor obtain an IRN or use its existing IRN(s) and assume the responsibly for entering all individual drivers in SFPS (including all subcontracted drivers); and consider requiring that the Transportation Contractor assign a District employee as a Data Reviewer role in the Contractor’s OEDS account so the District can confirm driver status. You may also consider assigning the District employee a Transportation Coordinator role, if you wish to grant them full access to your employee demographics (editing data, access to reports, etc).
- Consider utilizing drivers with their own IRNs/OEDS account and requiring that the driver assign a District employee as a Coordinator role in the driver’s OEDS account so the District can confirm driver status.
Related
Last Modified: 4/16/2025 11:17:08 AM