Blogs > The Reporter's Community Notebook

A notebook of local information for and written by the community.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Round-up of North Penn Transportation Information Session

North Penn School District officials held an information session Monday evening at the district's Educational Services Center to talk to parents about the changes the district had made so far and to hear about the issues parents were having with the current busing schedule.
LANSDALE – More than 100 irate parents packed a meeting on Monday with North Penn School District officials demanding that the district fix the problems their children have encountered since the school year began.
Private school and special education students bused outside the district have had long rides, late buses or no buses since North Penn partnered with four other districts in a transportation consortium to reduce busing costs. Officials were extremely apologetic and promised to fix the problems but parents remained exasperated. Read Full Story.
During the meeting, Dietrich asked parents to be patient as the district reconfigured the bus routes. Later the district posted Dietrich's opening remarks on its website.North Penn Superintendent Curtis Dietrich's open remarks regarding transportationParents addressed Dietrich, Director of Business Administration Robert Schoch, and members of the school board and the county transportation consortium telling stories of how their child had been late to school or had even taken the wrong bus and gotten lost.

One couple told officials that their child had been lost for over an hour after the student got on the wrong bus after her first day of school in 2009. After the incident, the parents had to buy a cell phone for the 5-year-old.

Parents posted their students' experiences with the district's busing system on The Reporter's Facebook page and website.

Michelle Duffy My youngest (michael) had a mix up his FIRST day of school. Was put on the wrong bus, but bus driver was great, they have RADIOS and we were in touch with them the whole time. Instead of freaking him out, we made fun of it. Believe it or not, he couldn't care less. He was on the school bus and knew eventually they would bring him home. I was more worried than he was!


THIS IS ABOUT SAFETY. In 2009, my daughter did not come home from school on her first day of kindergarten. Apparently there was a bus transfer that was taking place but this transfer was not communicated to any of the parents by North Penn or First Student. My daughter stayed on her originally assigned bus when she should have transferred. She was not found until late in the afternoon, after all of the children were dropped off and she was the last child sitting on the bus. The bus driver asked who she was and where she lived and told her she was on the wrong the bus. Needless to say I was frantic as a parent experiencing this nightmare. My husband and I demanded some answers. - Comment from WtrGrl73
The district is expected to hold a follow up meeting Oct. at 7 p.m. at North Penn Educational Services Center.

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Thursday, September 22, 2011

Your comments about Facebook's news features

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Facebook to announce major changes during F8 Developers Conference

Yesterday, we heard quite a few comments regarding Facebook's latest changes and most of you weren't very happy. Well, Facebook is about to announce even more, even bigger changes.

UPDATE 9/25: Video stream removed due to autoplay issues.

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Wednesday, September 21, 2011

POLL, DISCUSSION: Facebook's new features - Like or dislike?

We've seen quite a bit of conversation surrounding Facebook's latest feature update. Some good, some not so good and an overwhelming number of comments comparing Facebook to Google+.
So here's the question. Facebook's new look: Like or dislike?
Be sure to leave a comment and tell us exactly what you think.

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SLIDESHOW: Local pup photos in celebration of National Dog Week

This week, our Entertainment writer Amanda Piccirilli asked local readers on Twitter and Facebook for photos of your pups for this week's edition of Go, our local entertainment magazine which will appear in Thursday's edition of The Reporter.

Well, the community certainly came through.


Gathering over 30 (and growing) photos from across the Delaware region (and even a photo from a former North Penn resident now living in Florida), we've put together a slideshow presentation of your photos along with the stories you sent us about your four-legged friends.

But we aren't finished yet. Everyone and anyone can still send us their pup photos in celebration of National Dog Week but simply sending an email to Amanda Piccirilli at apiccirilli@thereporteronline.com.

At the beginning of each day, we will ad more photos submitted by the community so be sure to tell your (two-legged) friends!

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Tuesday, September 6, 2011

This week's top 5 blog posts for the week ahead - 9/5/2011