Form NHTSA Form 1415 NHTSA Form 1415 Appendix A-1_Interview Guide_

OMB Control Number: XXXX-XXX

Expiration Date: XX/XX/XXXX

Appendix A-1: Interview Guide – State/District Transportation Leader

Interviews are intended to occur as a fluid, conversational dialogue. Therefore, this document is designed to serve as a guide to ensure that all critical topics/areas are covered. The document is organized by general topics that should be discussed during the interviews. Each topic includes high-level bulleted notes (left column) and examples of questions (right column) to help prompt the interviewer, keep conversation flowing, and ensure that the most important information is gathered.

Intro	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Summary and Consent
This took me almost a full minute to get through – without the interviewee saying anything. If we are sending a study description ahead of time, then a lot of this is duplicative. Lets ask if they have any questions at the end. No need to get sidetracked before getting started. If they have questions ahead of time, they will ask them.	Under the Paperwork Reduction Act, a federal agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to collection of information subject to the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act unless that collection of information displays a current valid OMB Control number. The OMB Control Number for this information collection is XXXX-XXXX (expiration date: MM/DD/YYYY). The average amount of time to complete the screening is 5 minutes. All responses to this collection of information are voluntary. If you have comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden send them to Information Collection Clearance Officer, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, W51-312, 1200 New Jersey Ave, S.E., Washington, DC, 20590. Thank you again for participating in this study, as described in the email and consent form you received, the overall goal of this project is to gain a better understanding of the decisions that districts and agencies face when considering school bus seat belt implementation and use. IF WE HAVE SIGNED CONSENT: I see that you have read the study description we sent and we have received your signed informed consent document. Thank you for sending that. IF WE DO NOT HAVE SIGNED CONSENT: It appears that we have not received the informed consent, so we need to take a moment before we begin to make sure you agree to the interview before proceeding. Have you read the study overview document we sent? If not, would you like me to read through the overview to ensure you feel comfortable with the interview. (Read overview if participant has not read it). Having heard/read the project overview, do you, ______________________________ (interviewee name), agree to participate in this study with the understanding that you may withdraw at any time without penalty? IF YES: Thank you. IF NO: Thank you for your time. We will not proceed with the interview.
District Policy
	Based the information provided us by _______, we understand that your district HAS/HAS NOT CONSIDERED implementing or ordering school buses with seat belts and IF HAS CONSIDERED, DECIDED TO or DECIDED NOT TO implement or order buses with belts. Verify or correct. HAS NOT CONSIDERED – Please explain why HAS CONSIDERED BUT DECIDED NOT TO – PLEASE EXPLAIN WHY. (Interviewer fill in check box of reasons – all that apply) HAS IMPLEMENTED / ORDERED BUSES. IF YOU HAVE IMPLEMENTED BELTS, ARE THESE LAP BELTS, LAP/SHOULDER BELTS or SOME OF EACH? IF YOU HAVE IMPLEMENTED BELTS, IS THERE A DISTRICT POLICY THAT ADDRESSES WHETHER OR NOT STUDENTS MUST USE THE BELTS? IF SO DESCRIBE. DESCRIBE INSTRUCTIONS TO THE DRIVERS TO ENFORCE THE POLICY INCLUDING ANY DISCIPLINARY ACTIONS FOR NOT FOLLOWING THE RULES.

Theme	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Motivation
Brief recap of our intent Motivation for implementing belts ONLY FOR THOSE THAT IMPLEMENTED	Was there a specific event or series of events that prompted the district to decide to implement or not implement seat belts on school buses? What factors may have influenced this decision? Local champion, parent concern…
Context (ask only for those who implemented)
Relevant background info	About how many regular route buses does your district operate? How many of those buses have seat belts? How long have you had them? Did you phase in seat belts or implement them all at once? Do you have plans to implement additional seat belt-equipped buses?

Theme	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Policy – Implementation and Use (ask only for those who implemented)
Requirements Use Enforcement	Implementation Lets talk a little bit more about the policies that are in place that require the implementation and/or use of seat belts on school buses. What are the specific district policies regarding installation of belts on school buses? Are seatbelts mandated on retro-fit buses? Are the policies mandated by state statute or law? Are there statutory funding mechanisms in place? What types of buses are mandated to have belts (Type A, Type B, Type C, Type D)? What can you tell me about how your district developed your policies regarding installation of belts? Who proposed the implementation of belts on buses? Did they reference other school districts or legislation? Use Only if they have a use policy: Please describe how your required use policy is enforced? Do you have participation in use requirement from all levels within the district (school board, superintendent, principals, bus drivers)? Which of these received information about the implementation of belts? Describe, including any results. Which of these received training about the implementation of belts? Describe, including any results.

Theme	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Funding (ask only for those who implemented)
Methods/sources of funding Federal safety grants? Cost/Scope New/retrofit Barriers and resistance to acquiring funding	We are interested in identifying the different policies, strategies and sources used for funding seat belts. Please describe the sources of funding used to purchase new or replacement school buses. What is the process for purchasing new school buses in your district. Please describe how the district has or plans to fund the additional cost of seat belt installations? What is that additional cost? Were the additional funds provided by the school district? Did you consider federal safety grants? Did you have to use any creative/unusual approaches to fund the seat belts? What were your experiences, positive and negative, with acquiring funding for school bus seat belts specifically? What types of barriers or resistance did you face when trying to get funding? How did you overcome those barriers? Did you seek any sources of funding that didn’t work out? What aspects of your purchasing regulations made the process more or less difficult? Did you acquire new buses with seat belts, or retrofit them in existing buses? If retrofit, did it include replacing the entire seat or just the seat back?

Theme	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Experiences with Stakeholders & Best Practices
Reactions/Interactions with Multi-Sector Stakeholders: Inside the Institution Transportation Directors School Administration Teachers Bus Drivers School Board Outside the Institution Media City Councils Parents, PTA/PTSA Local Safety Groups Students Achieving Buy-in Public awareness/outreach	We are interested in the reactions of and interactions with various stakeholders regarding the acquisition and implementation of seat belts. Stakeholders may include individuals/groups inside your organization (e.g. transportation directors, school administration, teachers, bus drivers, school board), outside of your organization (e.g. media, city councils, parents, PTA/PTSA, local safety groups) and students. When thinking about these various stakeholder groups, would you say that people were generally supportive of the implementation of seat belts or against it? Are there any reactions of or interactions with stakeholders that particularly stand out to you? Did you receive push-back from any of these individuals/groups in particular? Please describe. Were any of these individuals/groups particularly supportive or helpful? Please describe. Did you take any steps ahead of time to achieve buy-in from various stakeholder groups? If so, what actions were taken? Was any media/outreach used to inform people of the seat belts and/or encourage compliance? (e.g. news articles, letters to parents, assemblies, etc.)

Theme	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Compliance & Student Behavior (ask only for those who have implemented and have a policy in place) I think we will have covered a lot of this earlier in the interview.
Usage & enforcement Student behavior	Do you have a usage policy in place to require students to wear the seat belts? If so, how is it enforced? Have you used any other methods to encourage compliance? (e.g. reminders/referrals from bus drivers, letters to parents, etc.) What methods do you think have been the most effective in encouraging compliance? In general, do you think that the seat belts have influenced student behavior on the buses? Have you collected any data or video to track this potential influence? What type of feedback have you received from the bus drivers? Do bus drivers write referrals on the bus? If so, are these tracked? (before/after belts) Are the referrals supported / acted on by school administrators?
Bus Driver Survey
	We are also interested in getting a better understanding of bus driver distraction related to student behavior and seat belts to see if the use of seat belts has impacted student behavior on buses. We have an online survey that asks bus drivers about topics like distraction, stress, and student behavior. We do not ask for names of bus drivers, and only ask them to name their school district for tracking purposes; we will not indicate which survey responses came from which school district. I can provide you with a hard copy of the survey questions first, if you’d like. Then would ultimately send a link that the bus drivers could use to complete the survey. Would you be willing to share this survey with your bus drivers?

Theme	Dialogue Guidance/Questions:
Barriers & Lessons Learned
Barriers/resistance regarding funding, implementation, or enforcement Lessons learned and advice for other jurisdictions	( Note: We ask about resistance/push-back when discussing funding and stakeholders, so at this point we will likely have already covered barriers in the various other sections. May just want to wrap up by asking if there are any other hurdles/barriers that haven’t been discussed yet.) Are there any other issues or barriers that you faced that we haven’t discussed yet? What are the most important “lessons learned” or advice that you think would be useful to jurisdictions who are considering implementing seat belts on their buses?

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NHTSA Form 1415