All-Star Transportation

All-Star Transportation believes our staff is our greatest resource. We look forward to working with you and helping you achieve your career goals as a driver, a mechanic or in a support capacity. We offer benefits, including health and dental, and great hours.

All-Star Transportation provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, marital status, amnesty, or status as a covered veteran in accordance with applicable federal, state and local laws. All-Star Transportation complies with applicable state and local laws governing non-discrimination in employment in every location in which the company has facilities. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including, but not limited to, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training.

To become a school bus driver you need a Connecticut Class B commercial driver’s license (CDL), or higher, along with Class P, S and V endorsements. You also need to meet several requirements, including, but not limited to:

– Background checks – CT DCF, National Sex Offender, criminal and previous employers.
– Periodic drug testing – pre-employment, random and other DOT required tests.
– Maintaining a clean driving record.
– Medical reviews – DOT pre-employment physical and others as needed to renew license.
– Special school bus driver training and certification – pre-service training, monthly and annual safety meetings, and other training as required by All-Star management or law.

If you don’t have the required license and endorsements, our trainers will assist you in completing the steps needed to become a licensed school bus driver. We provide paid training and our classes are offered on a regular basis in several locations. So, apply now.

Requirements:

– Must have Connecticut driver’s license or ability to obtain one.
– Must have held a driver’s license from any state for at least three years.
– If not licensed for five years or more in Connecticut, criminal and motor vehicle histories are required.
– Must have an excellent driving record. No suspension or revocation within the past 10 years.
– Must be certified by CT DMV that you have no more than four points against your driver’s license.
– Must possess good moral character.
– Must pass a criminal record check. No felony or convictions as legislated by the State of Connecticut.
– Must pass a DOT physical and meet physical requirements.
– Must meet federal identity requirements prior to training.
– Must complete pre-service training.

Pre-Service Training

– Minimum 20 hours classroom work.
– Minimum 40 hours behind the wheel.
– Must have a flexible schedule as class days and hours may change.
– Must be prepared for all weather conditions. Proper footwear and attire needed.
– All training hours are paid, including classroom and behind-the wheel sessions.
– Additional costs for licensing are paid by the applicant. These are minimal and will be explained in pre-employment interview.

All-Star Transportation employees participate in National School Bus Safety Week. This year's theme was "My Driver, My Safety Hero."

WASHINGTON – The way Gary Clark figures it, he has been engaged in teaching and training for most of his working life. So, when he retired after 37 years at the same company and joined All-Star Transportation, it felt natural for him to become both a driver and a trainer.

Clark, 73, worked for a large chemical and oil company, beginning his career after graduating from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute with a degree in chemical engineering. His first job was in Costa Rica and, from there, he rose through the ranks to eventually become president of the company’s international division.

He joined All-Star 10 years ago, about a year after building a new house in Woodbury. Clark, who says “I couldn’t find Woodbury on a map” before relocating to Connecticut, now is very familiar with school bus routes and roads throughout the Washington area.

“By the time I completed my second year, I had done every route and driven every vehicle,” he says. “Around 2011, I became a trainer. I’ve trained a lot of people in a lot of different things. I had an education as a chemical engineer, so I had to train junior chemical engineers. And eventually I became a senior marketer, and I had to train junior marketers. Then I became an officer of the company, and I had to train everybody. There are some consistent streams or similarities in all forms of training.

“One thing that I did observe here is that we have a pretty diverse group of people – young and old, male and female – people from all different walks of life, but they all approach the (driver) testing process with trepidation, even though they know how to drive and even though they may have passed their prior tests three or four times. They are still very nervous about being able to pass their test.

“And so, what I have found is that it’s not the content of the training that is the most critical path, it is how you manage their emotional barriers to training. You learn how to handle unfounded fears. The pressure of ‘My God, I have to go in front of a stranger and do this.’ It’s really a question of getting them to understand that it’s not very hard at all and just show them what you know.”

All-Star’s good fortune in hiring Clark was the result of one of the country’s great tragedies – the Sept. 11, 2011 attacks on the World Trade Center. Clark and his wife were living in New York at the time of the attack. In fact, their home was in Battery Park City, four blocks south of the World Trade Towers at the southern tip of Manhattan.

On Sept.11, after the first airliner struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center, Clark was outside his talking with people when he witnessed a second aircraft strike the South Tower. He quickly returned home to tell his wife and her mother that they had to pack – they were getting out of Manhattan. Then later that morning as he was standing on West Street talking to a police officer about how get out of New York, the first of the Twin Towers collapsed.

“I had a clear view of the building,” he recalled. “As it started to come down, you could hear it. There was a tremendous noise because it pancaked floor on floor. It became a continuous series of explosions on the way down.”

When the tower collapsed, Clark and the police officer were overwhelmed by a fast-moving cloud of dust, smoke and debris. “It took at least five minutes before you could see your hand in front of your face,” he remembered.

When he could see again, Clark returned home, looking for his family. When he realized no one was home, he searched every building in the area looking for them. In each building he shouted for his wife, but in the chaos, he did not hear her reply. Eventually, she and others in the area were evacuated to New Jersey. Clark, meanwhile, retrieved the family car and as he was driving out of the city, he received a call from his son telling him where his wife was located. Clark had to take a long, roundabout route to escape the city and eventually reunite with his wife.

Following that attack, Clark and wife decided they needed a home outside the city. So, he searched and settled upon Woodbury. He purchased land and built a new house, which solved one problem but created another issue.

“So, here I am in a brand-new house with brand new furniture, everything is absolutely immaculate. There is virtually nothing left to be done and my wife is working New York. And I said, ‘I can’t do nothing, I have to do something,’ and then I saw an ad in the paper for All-Star,” Clark recalled.

The advertisement announced openings for school bus drivers in Oxford and Washington. Clark went to both locations, eventually interviewing with Pam Newton in Washington, where he was hired as a driver. It was decision for which he has no regrets.

“I am happy doing this, and I get a feeling of reward,” he says.

All-Star Transportation employees work closely with our schools to combat bullying.

NEWTOWN – When Jim Tomassetti says that he’s seen it all as a bus driver, he’s not kidding. He began his career as a school bus driver 47 years ago, and when he starts talking about his experiences, the years flow by in an endless stream of entertaining remembrances and stories.

“My parents didn’t want me to be a driver, but I didn’t listen to them. All my friends were drivers,” says Tomassetti, who began driving a school bus at age 18 right after graduating in 1972 from Masuk High School in Monroe.

“I always knew I was going to be a bus driver,” he says, recalling a story that his mother told him. She said that when he was a young boy in Bridgeport, Tomassetti would become excited whenever he saw a city bus. “I guess I always had a thing for buses,” he adds.

When thinking back to his first days as a driver, Tomassetti becomes nostalgic. He started with the Dunn Bus Co. in Monroe, where he drove school buses for 10 years until the company went out of business. He recalls fondly driving Dodges with Ward bodies – “they had style, today they all look alike” – no power steering and no heat.

“It was all innocent,” he says of those early years. “So much has changed. The buses years ago, they made drivers out of you. I miss the shifting. You get spoiled with the automatic.”

Prior to driving a school bus in Newtown, Tomassetti drove in Easton and Trumbull, in addition to Monroe. He also drove a transit bus in Bridgeport for eight years during his off hours until he says “I couldn’t take it any longer.” One time while driving his city bus, he was assaulted by two men, one of who punched him in the face, knocking his glasses off. Bloodied, but not terribly injured, he completed his shift. Another time, a bank robber boarded his bus. The man had paid his fare, and no one knew he had just robbed a bank until police surrounded and boarded the bus to take the robber down.

“He robbed a bank and got on my bus, can you believe it?” Tomassetti says.

Driving a school bus was always the safer and better job, although it also had its challenges in the years when he first began driving. In addition to lacking heat and automatic transmissions, the buses also lacked radios. So, if a bus had a mechanical issue, the driver had to be a quick thinker and resourceful to get help and transport students safely to school.

“It was good, the responsibility,” he says, adding, “it was simpler times.”

When he first began driving in Newtown, he did so as an independent contractor. He owned and maintained his own bus, taking on the responsibility of having his bus inspected every year and fit for the road. In fact, all the buses in Newtown were operated by independent contractors until All-Star Transportation secured a town-wide contract seven years ago. After All-Star took over, Tomassetti joined its staff in Newtown.

His years of experience have taught him many lessons, especially when it comes to the care of the students he transports. He says he has more patience now when dealing with students. But he adds that when he tells his students to do something, he expects his orders to be followed and his students generally obey. Like many drivers, he also has built relationships with his parents. In fact, when he had hip replacement surgery this past summer, it was the mother of one of his students who drove to his hospital in Hartford to pick him up and take him home.

He says the worst day of his career was the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012. He had two students that afternoon that he had to take home to Sandy Hook. To protect them, he had them lie down on the bus seats so that onlookers and the news media could not see them.

“I could not stop crying,” he said, explaining that he had to take time off after the shooting to recover.

Then, pausing to reflect further on the tragedy, he added, “I do love my kids.”

Our schools appreciate the work we do and each year they typically host Driver Appreciation Days for us.

NEW MILFORD – Even though women hold many key positions at All-Star Transportation, the staff at the company’s three maintenance shops had for years remained all male. But that changed this spring when Sarah Fontoura was hired as a service technician in New Milford.

“I love cars,” the 23-year-old Fontoura says. “I was raised on cars. My dad has been a mechanic all his life for the MTA (Metropolitan Transit Authority) in the Bronx. Every weekend we went to car shows, and we still do that today.”

But Fontoura brings more to the job than just a passion for cars. After graduating from New Milford High School in 2013, she completed a two-year automotive technician program at Naugatuck Valley Community College, earning an associate’s degree. She also became a skilled welder while at NVCC.

After completing her schooling, Fontoura worked for two years at a large auto repair shop, where she mainly did tire repairs and oil changes. Wanting to do more, she applied to become a service technician at All-Star after seeing a help-wanted advertisement on Indeed, the Internet-based employment company.

“This is a good job,” she says. “I realize that these type of jobs are hard to come by for women. Not many (shops) like women mechanics. Many are disrespectful. I was once turned down for an interview because I’m a woman.”

But her work experience since joining All-Star in March has been refreshingly different.

Sarah Fontoura“The guys here a great,” she says, naming all her co-workers who have helped and provided guidance. “I’m starting at the bottom, but if I find a bus that needs brakes or belts, I get to do it.

“I can’t learn by textbook,” she adds. “I learn by being in the shop and doing it.”

In her spare time, Fontoura, as might be expected, tinkers with her two vehicles – a 1999 Firebird and a 2015 Jeep. She does all her own maintenance and repairs, while dreaming of the day when she has home with its own shop.

She also anticipates working toward certification as a master school bus technician after she becomes more settled in her job and learns more about buses. But she’s already acquired the materials need to pass the first test toward becoming certified.

“We are thrilled to have Sarah be a member of our maintenance team. Her energy and positive attitude are assets,” says Leslie Sheldon, All-Star Transportation’s operation manager.

All-Star drivers have fun with their students, no matter the holiday. For instance, many dres sin costume for Halloween.

All-Star employees are active members of the community, and when specials needs arise, they eagerly organize food drives, clothing drives and many other events to support their communities.