The name Don L. Rondeau might not ring an immediate bell in the school bus community. But it resonates in most security and anti-terrorism circles, and he’s making a conscious effort to embrace the yellow bus. In his own words, “The nation’s most critical assets are our children.”

Rondeau is spearheading the evolution of School Bus Watch, which has been on hiatus all summer following the program being taken from the American Trucking Association and awarded to private contractor HMS Company in May.

“Get ready to get ready,” urged a passionate Rondeau during a telephone call in mid-August. “The call is not to drop what you’re doing and run to another program but to be on alert to participate.”

At this writing, no timetable had been released for an official return of School Bus Watch; however, Rondeau did say “launch is imminent.”

Currently president and CEO of Total Security and an HMS Company board member, Rondeau made a name for himself as the program director of Highway Watch’s Information Sharing and Analysis Center at ATA, for which he won the Homeland Security Executive of the Year award in 2004. Prior, he was a contract investigator for the Department of Interior and a security consultant for the Embassies of the State of Kuwait and Qatar. He held similar positions with Boat America and Blockbuster Entertainment.

Congress awarded the three-year, $15.54 million Highway Watch contract and its School Bus Watch relative to HMS Company, which has provided fleet management services to the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and emergency call services for the U.S. Army. Under the ATA’s direction, Highway Watch trained more than 830,000 people and fielded more than 10,000 incidents.

“We’re fully aware of the value of the original program, but since the initial launch, TSA and the fleet administrators who have used the training have seen opportunities for enhanced messaging and communication,” said William Arrington, general manager of TSA’s Office of Highway and Motorcarrier. “HMS, assuming TSA’s highway domain awareness training grant, has assured TSA that a new School Bus Watch product, with a greater depth of instruction and a much broader reach in school systems, is a top priority. TSA has also been assured that all new training will continue to be developed in close cooperation with representatives of the school transportation industry.”

Rondeau has intimate knowledge of the program from his time at ATA, but he said to expect some positive changes with the new iteration.

“Whenever you launch a program like this, it’s bound to be high profile and prone to be political,” he said. “But our intent is to work with (the school bus industry). They need our experience and threat assessment capabilities in a politically-neutral way. When it comes to protecting our country and school buses in particular, we put politics aside.”

Rondeau’s methods are said to reflect the efforts of both public and private sector security experts. As 9/11 showed, communication and collaboration is vital.

“He is the real deal and may be the only person who has the clout to get these programs out of the political arena and to the end user,” commented one security expert, who provides state training to school bus and truck companies alike.

Rondeau said the revised School Bus Watch program will not only identify key stakeholders within the industry as partners but will seek out other professionals to help the program evolve. From there, School Bus Watch will be customized to meet the specific needs of the entire industry as well as regional- and local-level operations based upon real-life threats and experience, all while tapping high-level government and private industry security experts. Joe Allbaugh, the director of FEMA during the 9/11 attacks, and Steven McKale, the former deputy administrator at TSA, are also onboard.

“The school bus community I think gets requests or calls to action quite frequently. This is more of an opportunity to be proactive, to lead the charge in protecting themselves in a way that makes sense for their operations and their community,” Rondeau added. “They don’t need us to tell them how to run their business.”

Reprinted from the October 2008 issue of School Transportation News magazine. All rights reserved.