From: Commission Transport UPMD
To: Ryan Erwin
Cc: UPMD Transport
Subject: Re: DERNIER RAPPEL - INSCRIPTION TRANSPORT SCOLAIRE 2025-2026 /THƯ NHẮC LẦN CUỐI - ĐĂNG KÝ XE ĐƯA ĐÓN HỌC SINH 2025-2026 / LAST REMINDER - SCHOOL TRANSPORT REGISTRATION 2025-2026
Date: Tuesday, June 17, 2025 19:09
Dear Ryan,
Thanks to [email protected] for having forwarded your message to us and sorry for the late reply ! Please find our answers to your questions in blue below:
If UPMD will not "Manage School Transport" for 2026-2027, then how will it be managed?
UPMD is currently in discussions with the school in the hope that it will take over the management of school transport. As LFI Duras is managed directly by the French government via the AEFE (Agence pour l'Enseignement Français à l'Étranger), it will be up to this Agency to take position on this project and to authorise (or not) the headmaster to take on this responsibility. UPMD has sent LFI Duras all the files relating to the operation of school transport. LFI Duras has forwarded these files to AEFE. We hope to receive a reply from the Agency in September or October.
Will us parents be working directly with SBS but without UPMD involved?
If the Agency's reply is negative, this is indeed a possible solution. In this case, UPMD will ask SBS if it agrees to provide the school transport service without UPMD's interface and under which conditions.
If we had more parents helping UPMD, then would UPMD continue to manage this for the 2026-2027 year?
Since 2010, school transport has been managed by UPMD, parents' association, originally for less than 600 students. The initial idea was to provide a service to the parents of these children, given that school transport was not managed by anyone or any entity. Initially, school transport could easily be managed by 2 parents (fewer children, fewer routes, fewer buses). Since then, the management of the service has increased considerably as student numbers have risen (now 1,000 using the service). However, the number of parents (2) managing school transport has never changed! Unfortunately, the voluntary time that these two parents can give is no longer sufficient. At present, the time devoted to managing school transport is equivalent to a part-time job, i.e. around 4-5 hours a day, with peaks in activity at the time of enrolment and the start of the school year. Furthermore, this management work as a volunteer is not likely to ensure the long-term future of the school transport service, because of the relatively frequent turnover of parents and the limited time they can devote to volunteering, due to their professional responsibilities. Lastly, the parents who have been in charge of school transport since 2018 will soon no longer have any children attending LFI Duras and, as a result, will no longer be UPMD members and therefore will not be able to manage it anymore. Calls for help from parent members, repeated every year at our general meetings, have not been as successful as we had hoped, so we believe that the best solution for ensuring the long-term future of the activity remains management by LFI Duras. We're keeping our fingers crossed that this will be the case! Whatever the AEFE's reply, UPMD will keep all parents informed of the situation as it develops. If necessary, UPMD will bring them together to discuss once again the future of the service.
With kind regards,
UPMD Transport Committee parent volunteers
Note that some of this was also covered in the General Assembly Report
https://www.upmd.fr/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/cr-en-ago-09_11_24.pdf