NorCalUrban

The San Jose Mercury News reports on a recurring problem with East Palo Alto teens: Carlmont High School freshman Joshua Brass was kicked out of a morning advanced English class after walking in late or missing almost every class the first few weeks of school. But it's not because he skipped class or hit his alarm clock's "snooze" button too many times. It's because for the first month of school, buses to his school were as much as one hour late three-quarters of the time. Joshua and the hundreds of other East Palo Alto students who are bused 10 miles to Carlmont in Belmont have missed many hours of lectures and class work - time that's especially precious for East Palo Alto students, whose dropout rate is double the district average. "The worst part is that many kids are so conditioned that the bus comes late, they don't have a sense of urgency about getting to school," said Larry Moody, a board member of the Ravenswood City elementary school ...