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T


he Youngstown City school district in Ohio serves some 7,000 public and parochial school students during the regular school year with 73 buses, 60 drivers and four bus mechanics.


For almost every aspect of its school bus operations utilizes technology. This includes apps for parents to know their stu- dent whereabouts and bus schedules, tracking driver behavior and bus location and a digital record of the maintenance history of each bus. Tablets, video, GPS all come together and add great value for the district. For Youngstown and many other districts, the conver- gence of technology is their killer app and soul of their new machine.


But while technology for bus transportation has advanced


greatly in recent years, much of this advancement has been disparate. GPS has improved greatly in its reach and accuracy. Tablets are being used in multiple ways as tools to help with everything from communications to location, maintenance and behavior tracking. Video technology has advanced with greater megapixel capacity. Software and apps are now tailored to not just transportation systems, but specifically school buses. “I think the most important module is that all of your


software assist you in achieving your goal so it is a must that each integrate with the other,”says Colleen Murphy-Penk, chief of transportation at Youngstown City Schools. “We have been successful in achieving this goal so far. We have some of our software hosted and some we host on our own server to make this all come together.” For districts like Youngstown, the convergence of technol- ogy for school bus fleet management is upon us. Its benefit is shining through as districts are using it to improve overall operations like never before. It’s taken a while to achieve this; however, many districts are reaping the technology, its conver- gence, the data it produces and the ability to use such data to manage their overall operations. “With GPS reading programs we can track the location of our buses, so if a driver calls in a duress signal, we can get an accurate location description to law enforcement,” explains Lawrence Hannan, operations director for Unified School District 320 in Wamego, Kansas. “The camera systems have


also proven to be a good friend to our drivers when children have reported things on the buses that the cameras prove did not happen. We also can review vehicle speeds at any given time in the past using systems. This has been useful when patrons believe the vehicles are traveling faster than they really are. We are just implementing a tablet solution on our buses so the jury is still out on how useful these devices will prove to be.”


When these technologies converge, all who embrace them may achieve great efficiency. “Although we’re a relatively small district with 150 buses,


the service we provide would be next to impossible with the same level of accuracy and efficiency without the use of GPS and routing software,” explains Michael Carter, transportation director of Bay District Schools in Panama City, Florida. “Re- cently our services have been taxed with new legislation such as McKinney-Vento (Homeless Assistance Act) and foster (care) placements, and we find ourselves routing and re-rout- ing every single day of the school year.” This leaves little time for many important and necessary monitoring protocols to ensure safety and fleet service manage- ment that Carter said would be impossible without the aid of technology. “When you combine these daily protocols with the volume of inquiries from parents and staff regarding student where- abouts, there’s virtually no scenario that would play out as timely without this technology as it does with it,” he adds. “And when you add the benefit of video surveillance and the role it plays to protect students, staff, and equipment, the stock in technology rises exponentially.” But Carter says there’s even more benefits to technology that has yet to come. “Considering that this is where we are currently with technology, the landscape is an open canvas to future potential,” he says. “For example, one could envision the use of technology to assist in lost child locator service, instant parental access to routing changes, virtual elimination of liability, student financial reporting, and the list goes on and on.”


Student and school bus tracking apps continue to prolifer- ate as school districts realize the benefit of instantly updating parents on the comings and goings—on the school bus and


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