An inside look into the live feature of REI cameras.
that and that’s why I’ve been with them for so long.” Meanwhile, Joshua Rice, the director of transportation and fleet services in Barbers Hill Independent School District in Texas, recalled a similar time 15 to 20 years ago. “I can remember having boxes with tint on the front of them, connected to the ignition to illuminate a red light,” he said, adding that districts at the time were lucky to get two hours of video footage before the tape rewound and began recording over footage. Nowadays, he said, cameras have become more useful than simply for student discipline. “In fact, supervisors often find themselves relying on [cameras] to resolve a parent complaint about their [em- ployee’s] driving,” he said, adding that all 60 school buses as well as Chevy Suburbans in Barbers Hill’s fleet have Safety Vision cameras. The older buses have four cam- eras, while the newer buses have 10. The latter set-up includes four exterior cameras to provide a 360-degree view around the bus, which is displayed not only in the driver mirror but is also recorded on the DVR. Inside the bus, the district installed a dash cam that overlooks the hood, a camera fixed on the driver’s seat as well as the entrance door, and four wide angle cameras are installed throughout the passenger compartment. He added that due to the high back seats, the wide-angle cameras have greatly improved viewing within the passenger com- partments. “We also use the on-board video solution to monitor driving behaviors and to conduct part of the annual
30 School Transportation News • MAY 2022
appraisal for the employee,” Rice said. “Keeping up with school bus technologies such as camera systems en- sure that our operations are safe, efficient and effective day to day.” Deborah Mason, the director of transportation at
Community Unit School District 300 in Illinois, said that adding cameras to school buses just made sense, as the systems serve as an unbiased witness. “To [capture the view] of the unbiased witness on the school bus, to be able to share with everybody involved—whether it’s the school, the parents, the stu- dents, transportation, what actually did occur on the bus without it being through anyone else’s lens other than the camera which just provides facts,” Mason said of us- ing the DriveCam systems by Lytx. “It’s our one and only unbiased perception of what happens on a bus.” She noted that sometimes students can have misper-
ceptions about an incident, so having cameras provides reassurance on what occurred. “It really has been a game changer,” she added, noting that the district has been contracting with Durham School Services since 2007. This year cameras are installed on all 163 yellow bus routes. The DriveCam event recorders mount on the inside
of the vehicle with dual recording ability, capturing the road ahead and view of the driver, explained Anna Lam, communications specialist for Durham’s parent company National Express. She noted that video recordings are cap- tured when the camera is triggered by a sudden change in motion such as hard braking, swerving or a collision.
PHOTO COURTESY OF REI.
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