If you want to witness history in the making, sometimes you have to be willing to wait--not to mention drive a school bus for five or six hours. When the 2002 Winter Olympics came to Utah, it was understandably a huge deal. Some Salt Lake City schools shut for the two-week event.

Other districts, like Washington County in the southwest part of the state, are much closer to Las Vegas than to the main Olympic venues. Nonetheless, busloads of Washington County students took advantage of the free tickets that Salt Lake Olympic organizers offered to schools throughout the state to witness some of the events. And, in many cases, AFT members drove them there in school buses.

By bus, Salt Lake City is almost six hours from St. George, the biggest town in Washington County. The buses, of course, can't just drop the students at the front gate, so with crowds, security and everything else, the buses had to leave almost in the middle of the night in some instances.

"It's worth it," says driver Val Scott, a vice president of the AFT-affiliated Washington County Federation of Teachers. "That's history right there." Scott discussed some of the drivers' concerns before the Olympics. High school students are used to being on buses for long rides and being gone the whole day, she says. Some middle school kids might also have some similar experiences, but when you get down to 5th and 6th graders (the youngest kids didn't go), that's different. Lest you forget, school buses don't have restrooms.

Unfortunately for the drivers, about half of them had to witness history via a hotel television set because of regulations about working hours. Each Olympics-bound bus included two drivers. One would drive to a hotel about five hours from St. George, then the second would take over for the rest of the trip while the first driver waited at the hotel. On the return, the starting driver would do the return leg from the hotel back home. In Utah, drivers are only allowed to drive 10 hours and be on duty for 15 hours in a day.

Scott doesn't downplay the challenging assignment, especially with the students so excited by the trip, but, "I was a trip driver for four years straight, so I've put up with a lot more than that."

Dave Gardner, the union's local president, is more concerned about the long-term impact of the Olympics on the state's economy and on education funding. Contrary to some predictions, "the Olympics are going to cost us big time," he comments. "I'm worried they're going to turn around and tell us for the next five or six years that they spent too much taxpayer money."