Elsah Families

Helpful Links

• Early Learning Center
• Acorn
• Before- and After-School Care

Illinois Bus Information

We offer a round-trip service from Elsah to the School campus in St. Louis on school days throughout the year in partnership with Illinois Central Bus Company. Our P1 bus is for children ages X–X and our P2 bus is for children ages X–X. Chaperones ride each bus. Please read on for information about departure and arrival times, fees, occasional riders, and bus rules. 

You can register your child for the Illinois bus through the enrollment process if s/he will be a regular rider.

Communications will be done via our School Portal, so it is important that you have an active School Portal account and that you keep the school apprised of your current email address. If you need help with your School Portal account, the administrative assistant at each division of the school can help you. We are grateful for your daily metaphysical support for the bus program.

Please take some time to review the important information and helpful reminders below.

Fees

The fee for the bus continues to be $990 per child for the school year. Occasional riders are charged $4.50 for one way, and $9 for riding both in the morning and the afternoon. The bus chaperone will keep a record of occasional riders on P-1. Occasional riders on P-2 will need to sign a form indicating the date they rode and whether it was one way or both ways.

Departure and Arrival Times

Please refer to the bus schedule for information on P-1 and P-2 arrival and departure times.

Please arrive a few minutes before departure time each morning so that the children can safely board the buses, and they can depart on time. If you do not arrive before the bus departs, you will need to drive to the next stop or all the way to the St. Louis Campus. The buses are not allowed to pull over on the public roads between their official stops.

Evening traffic could affect the time when the buses arrive on their return trip—making them early or late. Please arrive at the stops 10 minutes before the published times ready to receive your children in case the bus arrives early. This includes children being picked up at the flagpole. As soon as the bus arrives, you are expected to take responsibility for your children. If you desire to have your Lower School student walk to your office or on-campus home, please communicate the arrangement to Amy Hagenlocher.

Occasional Rides on the P-2 Bus

Middle School students who are required to stay on the St. Louis Campus after school for athletics, meetings with teachers, or other school related business MUST then go to the After-School Program to wait for the P-2 bus (at no additional charge). Middle School students who just choose to go to that program for recreational purposes and Lower School students who go to that program to wait for parents to pick them up will be charged the regular fee. No Middle School students may be in other locations around the St. Louis campus without adult supervision.

Occasionally there are after-school Lower School classes or scouting meetings in which students may want to participate. They, too, may go to the After-School Program at no additional charge, but they must be able to get themselves to the bus stop at 5:45 p.m., act appropriately while waiting for the bus, and be supervised by a responsible Upper Schooler or adult on the P-2 bus. (First and second grade students are required to have an adult or U/S bus rider to help them with this.) Please contact the Dean of Students office so that we are aware of this arrangement. No Lower School students may be in other locations around the St. Louis campus without adult supervision.

Students getting off at the Clifton Terrace bus stop should inform the bus chaperone or driver when getting on the bus that day. The bus chaperone on P-1 will hopefully be aware of this from parental communications. The P-2 driver will usually ask if anyone is getting off, but having the child inform him helps avoid a problem. It’s hard for the driver to communicate with students the full length of the bus while also driving.

Bus Rules

Please go over the bus rules with your child. It’s important for students to understand that their behavior impacts others on the bus. We especially ask parents of Middle and Upper School students to remind their children of the importance of ensuring a harmonious, orderly bus ride on P-2 since there is no chaperone on that bus. The bus driver needs to focus his attention on operating the vehicle. Students’ behavior must be appropriate or they will lose the privilege of using this form of transportation.

One reminder for parents of students who ride the P-1 bus:

We cannot stress enough how important it is for parents to communicate in writing with the chaperone any changes to their child’s normal riding pattern. If a regular rider is not riding the bus home or is getting off at a different stop, please write that information in a note and give it to the bus chaperone.

In an unusual emergency when you have not been able to make such arrangements ahead of time, you should call Jen Wood in the Lower School Office (314.514.3195) by 2:30 p.m. to leave a message for the bus chaperone. The school will attempt to deliver the message to the child and the chaperone but cannot be responsible if the circle of communication cannot be completed.

There are times when a student tells the school there is a change in the normal routine, but we have no communication from the parent. In some cases, the child is accurate. In other cases, the child isn’t. You can imagine how hard it is for the school personnel to make a determination of what to do with the child—not knowing if a parent will be at the College, in Alton, or driving down to the St. Louis Campus. Our general rule is to go with the child’s normal routine if we haven’t heard from the parent.

Bus Chaperone Substitutes

As in years past, we need to put together a list of bus chaperone substitutes for times when the chaperone may need to take care of her children’s or her own personal needs. If you can help, please contact the St. Louis Human Resource Office at 314.514.3120. Substitutes are paid $26 each way.