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A dream job

Marshall school bus driver pushes safety

Photo by Jody Isaackson Marshall School bus driver Deb Ertl stands next to her special needs bus. It comes equipped with seatbelts for the safety for her passengers.

MARSHALL — Deb Ertl says she’s got it made working her “dream job.”

The special needs school bus driver worked for Marshall Area Transit (MAT) for more than 20 years. The past five years she has driven for Southwest Tours of Marshall.

“When you really like what you do, you’ve got it made,” Ertl said.

Ertl likes the fact that the special needs students on her bus are safe because they wear seat belts.

“We have to use seat belts on my bus anyway, but they should be in all the buses. Kids just don’t sit down like they should,” she said.

Ertl hadn’t yet heard that Feb. 22 was to be the first Minnesota School Bus Driver Recognition Day, but she said school bus drivers have earned it. Students are not as respectful as they used to be.

“Bus drivers are saints. They put up with a lot of disrespect. Not on my bus, though,” she said. “At the beginning of the school year, I say, ‘As long as everything gets done my way, we’ll all be happy.'”

She nodded and grinned.

Ertl said she really likes the paraprofessionals who ride the bus with her passengers; they cooperate.

“I like my job. I like my bosses, and I like it here at Southwest Tours,” she said.

Ertl decided to check into bus driving after spraining her ankle. She was looking for a different profession. Her husband, Vince drives school buses part time.

“I thought if Vince can drive school bus, so can I,” she said.

She started studying for the test while she was convalescing.

Since then, Ertl has driven a route bus and also for extracurricular trips and MAT and the special needs bus, which she calls, “Sped.”

Her favorite extracurricular trips were for Marshall High School speech.

“I used to take the high school speech team to South Dakota and Iowa,” she said. “I’d spend the whole day listening to various speeches.”

The farthest she ever driven for any trip was when she took the Southwest Minnesota State University speech team on a trip to Moorhead last summer. Since then, she has told her bosses she doesn’t want extracurricular trips until her 7-year-old granddaughter is into extracurricular activities.

Bus driving takes commitment. Drivers have to get to work as early as 6 a.m. to do their pre-trip inspections and start their morning routes; even earlier in the winter to warm up the buses. They don’t get home until 5 p.m. on the average, and that is if they do not have an extra run that night.

They can be gone overnight or even for a week if they take students to competitions, conventions or class trips to other states.

In observance of School Bus Driver Recognition Day, Southwest Tours is serving drivers breakfast. Marshall Public Schools Superintendent Scott Monson will be the guest speaker, Southwest Tours owner Jim Hey said.

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