The first day of school at Butler Area School District has been moved back to Tuesday.

Students were scheduled to start school Thursday, but technical issues that threw the bus schedule into chaos have necessitated the delay, said Brian White, district superintendent.

White sent letters to parents regarding the situation on Monday and Tuesday, apologizing for the delay in families receiving their bus stops, routes and times.

The transportation issues arose when a software failure caused the elimination of much of the student transportation data.

“Almost 1,000 students' data was completely wiped out,” White said. “A few hundred more were randomly assigned to other places.”

He said a crew of five or six worked late into the night or overnight on Tuesday, but was unable to resolve the issue in time.

“To get it all right, we should slow down and start at the beginning of a week,” White said of the delay.

He said the software company that contracts with the district for transportation, Verzatranz, said it has remedied the issue by removing Microsoft Patch from the district's servers.

Instead of welcoming students, faculty and staff to their buildings Thursday, White said principals will spend the day reviewing bus routes and stops. Administrators must look at each student's address and make sure that student has been assigned to the correct bus stop, White said.

“I've had better days in my career,” White said on Wednesday.

The district was unable to simply use last year's bus stops on Thursday because there are 470 new kindergartners entering the district's elementary schools.

“Plus, a couple hundred kids move in and others move out each year, so our student body looks very different every year,” White said.

Asked why transportation wasn't worked out sooner in the interest of ensuring all systems were functioning properly, White said the system was up and running before crashing on Monday.

“I'm not sure it would have mattered (if officials had started on transportation earlier),” he said.

One parent in Butler Township said she is “very angry” with the district because the delay has caused more than just an inconvenience for her family.

“I rearranged my entire work schedule to be with my son on his first day of kindergarten,” said Eileen Fazzino. “Now, I work next week when school starts, so I'm probably not going to be able to take (Tuesday) off.”

She said the decision to delay the start of school should have been made a week ago.

“My kindergartner is very upset,” Fazzino said. “He had orientation last night and he was all excited, but now it's like, 'Well, not for another week.'”

She guesses that many parents are upset about the delay.

“It's frustrating,” Fazzino said.

As for how the delay will affect the remainder of the school year, White said the calendar will be adjusted in the near future.

He also said the delay will not result in any additional costs for the district.

“I apologize to our community,” White said. “I wish we weren't in this situation, but we are and we are going to work to rectify it.”