INDUSTRY CONNECTIONS
£ Navman Wireless’ new OnlineAVL 2 provides several ways for D.C. Public Schools to track vehicles and determine on-time busing. Clockwise, from top left: A vehicle list panel provides detail such as ignition duration, speed, and vehicle location. The aerial view map allows users to view expanded geography as well as clusters of vehicles. A street view map shows buses in front of the district’s Southwest terminal. The vehicle activity panel lists events, such as door open/ close and stop arm out/in, as well as timed updates along with their corresponding locations.
IN GPS WE TRUST D.C. PUBLIC SCHOOLS TURNS TO TECHNOLOGY TO HELP GET IT OUT
FROM UNDER FEDERAL RECEIVERSHIP WRITTEN BY RYAN GRAY
G
PS is helping the District of Columbia Public Schools solve decades-old challenges with on-time arrival of school buses
and customer service for the 3,200 students with special needs who receive transporta- tion services.
In December 2012, the U.S. District
Court for the District of Columbia dis- missed a 17-year-old case against the school district stemming from a class-action suit tied to unreliable school bus service that violated the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). In dismissing Petties v. DC on Dec. 19
during a public hearing, Judge Paul Fried- man officially turned over supervision of the special-education transportation program to the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE). However, actual court oversight was terminated in November, when the court also ended the requirements in the case governing payments to non-pub- lic special education schools and related service providers. OSSE has been working with Navman
Wireless on installing GPS and overhauling fleet management. Phase one was com- pleted last August to equip all 800 Type A school buses, but knowing the specific location of each vehicle is only one solution the technology offers. “On-time arrival was not only critical by knowing the location of the vehicle, but also
by knowing the geo-fences and the arrival space for each of the schools and how those interplayed,” said Nels Erickson, field ser- vices manager at Navman. “We were able to show accurately what percentage of on-time arrivals they had, and do that in real time. Before, it was a bunch of paperwork that needed to be processed.” Tat paperwork led to a “significant lag”
in operations, Erickson added. But now, transportation personnel are able to review routes and arrival times the very next morn- ing to determine real-world performance, identify root causes of problems and com- municate solutions to individual terminals and drivers. Mayor Vincent C. Gray called the resul-
tig case dismissal “a major accomplishment.” “Tese students deserve every opportu-
nity we can provide in education, and I’m proud to say that they are getting the kind of service they deserve,” he said. Superintendent Mahaley Jones add-
ed: “Looking back, we understood that we were facing an enormously difficult task when we took over student transportation services two years ago, but we knew that we had the full support of this administra- tion. Because of this extraordinary team effort and the commitment to excellent service provided by everyone at the Office of the State Superintendent of Education’s Division of Specialized Education and De- partment of Transportation, we have strong
20 School Transportation News February 2013
systems in place to maintain our commit- ment to special education students and their families.” Ryan Solchenberger, director of stu-
dent transportation for OSSE, said the district also implemented an overhaul to a parent-call center and entered into a new collective bargaining agreement with the union. He noted that the agreement would be signed within the next couple of months. Te district employs more than 1,500 school bus drivers and monitors. One hundred and fifty new flex-fuel
school buses are also being purchased to improve vehicle reliability. In addition to GPS, Navman Wireless
will install turn-by-turn navigation displays in each bus and will also track Medicaid- eligible students for district reimbursement. “We’re again using GPS as the lynchpin, but also providing an interface for drivers to be able to notate what students are getting on with a time/date stamp and geo-fence location, working with bell times,” added Erickson. “Te drivers will be able to say, yes, this student rode on this day and was delivered to school. Tat is also a custom- er-service validation for parents.”
Read Petties v. District of Columbia at
http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-dc- circuit/
1204239.html.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76