OSCEOLA COUNTY, Fla. — If difficult times often make us more understanding, then the caring Christine Ramsay employs should come as no surprise.

What You Need To Know

  • Christine Ramsay has been driving buses for Osceola County Schools for six years 

  • She often drives special needs students to and from school 

  • Bus driver and attendant learned sign language to better connect with riders

“My son brings that out in me. I was always a caring person, but I went beyond because of my son,” she said.

For the last six years, Ramsay has been driving buses for the School District of Osceola County, shuttling special needs students to and from school.

But, more recently, Ramsay took it upon herself to learn sign language to better communicate with those who entrust her with transport.

“We try to do sign: No candy! No candy, eating on the bus,” she said, while signing. “I talk with them. They evolve and get to trust me and my attendant and see we are there for them.”

Ramsay, who moved from New York, already cares for many people in her own home, from her 15-year-old son Matthew, who has Down syndrome, to her 97-year-old mother-in-law who suffers from dementia. In between her morning bus route and afternoon pickups, Ramsay often cooks for her family, sometimes a “Jamaican one pot,” in a nod to her roots.

Yet, learning a new skill like sign language alongside her bus attendant, Roma Fentress, is something that Ramsay relishes.

“They’re family … We want every one of our kids to feel like they belong. And they do belong,” she said. “I started working with these children and what I found was that it’s very important to communicate. These children, they trust you.”