Texas First Student Workers Join Teamsters Union

First Student school bus drivers and aides in McKinney, Texas, voted 48-15 to join Teamsters Local 745 in Dallas in the first step toward gaining improvements in their workplace. The drivers and aides are looking forward to negotiating as union members for fair wages, affordable health care and fair work rules. There are 70 workers in the bargaining unit.

“We’re happy to have work in this economy, but we also need to be able to support our families,” said Nathaniel Hollis, a driver with First Student in McKinney. “I have two kids I raise on my own and we’re all like family at work; we need to be paid what other drivers are paid in districts nearby and to have benefits we can afford.”

“I’m happy because I think voting to join the Teamsters will make this a better place to work,” said Terry Hawley, Hollis’s coworker at First Student in McKinney. “It will be good just knowing that things can’t change from year to year because we have a contract in writing, so we will know what to expect.”

According to Rod Cuevas, an organizer with Local 745, the workers formed a strong committee to organize. With the help of local and International Union organizers, the workers made house calls and put in a great amount of effort to make Teamster representation a reality.

This victory is the latest in an effort to organize private school bus and transit workers across the country. Drive Up Standards is a national campaign to improve safety, service and work standards in the private school bus and transit industry. Since the campaign began in 2006, more than 14,600 workers have become Teamsters.

Founded in 1903, the Teamsters Union represents more than 1.4 million hardworking men and women in the United States and Canada.