Students in Massachusetts will be getting new bus drivers: US military personnel

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker activated the National Guard on Monday to help transport students in several cities across the state to school amid a widespread bus driver shortage plaguing the return to in-person instruction.

Baker, a Republican, said Boston Public Schools is among those communities which "weren’t interested" in accepting help from troops at this time, but "left the door open to pursue it at some point later on," The Lowell Sun reported. In announcing the order Monday, the governor tweeted, "The safe and reliable transportation to school each day is critical to our children's safety and education."  "We’ve had conversations with a lot of our colleagues in municipal government about the issue associated with drivers, but people were not really sure where it was all going to land," Baker said at the State House on Monday, according to the Boston Herald. "Once it became pretty clear that there were going to be some communities that would be shorthanded … we started talking to the Guard."