Ü GETTING STARTED
Experts said one way to begin the KPI data tracking process is by gathering inter- nal data to establish a safety measure, a reliability measure and an efficiency measure.
Safety: Number of Acci-
dents. Record the number of accidents daily. Define acci- dents simply or in accordance with your state reporting definition.
Reliability: Number of
Road Calls. Track the total number of road calls each day. First, define a road call. This could be as simple as tracking an interruption in service. Tally these daily, and total them monthly and then annually. You now have a benchmark to compare with in the coming year.
Efficiency: Track the rider- ship or number of students riding the bus monthly. GPS programs make student tracking easier, but bus driv- ers can track actual ridership on a monthly basis without GPS. Pick the same day each month. Have each driver count the number of kids on the morning trip and the number on the afternoon trip. Divide the morning and after- noon total by two to establish an average.
to accommodate for the growth and, as a result, justifying the need for emergency buses. Her next step involved adopting formal metrics. She
adopted the Metropolitan Area Transportation Efficiency Study (MATES), which features its own set of KPIs for school transportation that a number of school districts in Colorado utilize. Like Karam, Dunbar began to see results in her fleet management expenditures. “It allowed me to increase my mechanic-to-bus ratio,
and safety plays into that,” she said, noting that many of the buses in her 108-bus fleet are 20-plus years old. She also was able to staff her training department, and increase her ratio of drivers to training and safety coordinators. She added that the most unique thing about MATES
was how it collects the basic data of her fleet. “It gave me enough information to calculate my cost per mile to be more current than what the district was charging outside entities, such as charter schools,” she said. “Te success for me is to understand the cost to get reimbursement owed to the fleet.”
TECHNOLOGY AS A KEY PLAYER Karam found his staff eager to learn about KPIs, but he
realized that other personnel, or even transportation direc- tors and supervisors, might be intimidated by KPIs. “Maybe some aren’t good at math, and that may hold them back,” he said, but added that routing software can help in this area. Regardless of manufacturer, routing software technology
today offers real-time information on what’s going on in operations. Te field of transportation is filled with data, and that’s where technology can enter the scene, said John Fahey, a consultant for Tyler Technologies’ Versatrans prod- uct who also leads the technology group of NAPT’s KPI Task Force launched last year. Technology offers the various “what if ” scenarios, so it can provide as little or as much data as one wants. “Tis pressure on districts to be as efficient as possible is
not going away, it will only be intensified,” Fahey said. Transportation departments that still use pencil and paper
can still begin their KPI process with a few pieces of data. Karam explained, “Even if it’s one or two items, you can get that going in no time, and then it’s easy to maintain.”
KPI
STANDARDS Effort on Route
NAPT’s KPI Task Force
is progressing with its goal of establishing a set list of KPI terms to be adopted industry-wide to help districts of all siz- es compare themselves to others in their league. Peter Lawrence, team leader of the NAPT Task Force’s Research group and director of transpor- tation at Fairport (N.Y) Central School District, said the group was ready to field test all the current definitions with the group's 100-plus volunteer members. “One of our goals
A CURRENT LIST OF KPIS THE NAPT KPI TASK FORCE IS REVIEWING. THE GROUP IS ALSO WORKING ON OTHER KPIS RELATED TO COSTS AND STAFFING.
• Average age of fleet • Runs per bus • Annual training hours • Students per run • Spare bus ratio • Students per bus • Students per run • Actual/Eligible students transported
ROUTING SOFTWARE PROVIDERS THAT CAN HELP
BusBoss
busboss.com
EasyBus
easybus.com
Education Logistics
edulog.com
Transfinder Corporation
transfinder.com
TransTraks
transtraks.com
Trapeze Group
trapezegroup.com
Tyler Technologies
tylertech.com
U.S. Computing
uscomputinginc.com
is to mirror definitions created by the Nation- al Congress on School Transportation,” he said. “The NCST is our indus- try’s bible, and we would like to see these KPIs eventually adopted by the NCST in 2015.” Robert Streeter, team leader of the feedback group and transpor- tation director for the Dysart Unified School District in Surprise, Ariz., noted that since the Task Force presented at the NAPT Summit last fall, the number of industry volunteers increased by almost 40 percent. “I believe that the more we get the message out about KPIs, the more people will be onboard,” said Streeter, who used KPIs before entering into student transportation and won the industry’s 2012 Larson Award.
52 School Transportation News April 2013
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