Southern schools are among those affected by a review of routes by the Ministry of Education that has this year resulted in 21 being terminated and 11 amalgamated or replaced with different routes.
Principals spoken to by the Otago Daily Times said the criteria used to assess the routes were unfair and questioned why the ministry was making it harder for pupils to get to school while also cracking down on attendance rates.
East Otago schools were hit particularly hard by the changes, which came into effect for the area on Monday.
East Otago High School had two routes terminated, while Waikouaiti School and Palmerston Primary School lost one route each. Other routes have been altered or combined.
East Otago High School principal Keith Fleury said the changes left parents upset.
"It hasn’t been handled all that well and some people have got upset.
"[The Ministry of Education] just look at Google Maps to design a route."
The move to combine routes and use larger buses had caused issues on small rural roads and a complaint had already been received by the school on Monday, he said.
"Students are having to get on the bus earlier sometimes now or getting home later because there’s a lot more people to drop off."
This caused "angst" within the school community and any "extra barriers" towards getting children to school did not help.
"It’s a national issue, attendance, and we’re no different to any other school. We’re battling that in all different fronts."
The school was attended by 172 pupils and many of them took the bus, he said.
Parent Jackie Cooper said her 12-year-old son used to get picked up 300m from his home, but the new route pushed that out to 3km.
The only options to get to the new pickup point were walking or a car ride.
"It’s not ideal. There’s no shelter; he can’t take his bike and secure it for the day; there’s poor lighting," she said.
"Kids need to be able to feel safe and secure at bus stops and I can’t understand why they’re interfering with it when it wasn’t broken — the bus run was running well."
The changes meant it would now be easier to send her son to a school in Dunedin.
Heriot School principal Colin McHutchon said the criteria applied by the Ministry of Education, in determining which school bus routes should continue, were "ridiculous".
He said the school’s Wilden bus route was terminated at the beginning of term 3, affecting two families and up to a potential five children.
"It’s about 25 to 30km to the end of that route, meaning car is the only other realistic alternative for our families.
"We have two 5-year-olds who could be taking the bus on that route, if it were still there, and they have younger siblings who would no doubt join them in time.
"I understand why the ministry wants to save money, and why it has to apply a kind of factory model to assessing criteria for which routes should be running. But applied on the ground those criteria are ridiculous, as they fail to take account of several important variables, and the changing rural population as families move to where the work is."
Mr McHutchon said that led to a lack of equity for families.
"Ideally, we’d like to see a lot more equity in terms of access to school buses for all our families. Every learner deserves to have the opportunity to take a bus to school."
Ministry of Education school transport group manager James Meffan said eligibility criteria for school transport assistance were intended to ensure the ongoing viability and integrity of local schooling networks.
"This helps to prevent inefficiencies in the network due to excess demand at some schools and surplus capacity at others."
The primary responsibility for transporting children to and from school rested with caregivers, Mr Meffan said.
"We may be able to help where distance and/or accessibility may be a barrier for students attending their closest state or state-integrated school."
