E
nvisioning the “Internet of Things,” the phraseology used to describe the ever-increasing and intercon- nected web of online communication and data points, on the school bus can seem to be a difficult
endeavor because so much with technology these days is esoteric. It is “in the cloud,” figuratively and literally. Increasingly, as the latest technology makes its way
onto school buses across North America, the industry’s collective imagination is less taxed in developing a men- tal picture. For example, tablets are becoming prevalent on school buses to provide hands-free, turn-by-turn route navigation as well as student ridership verification for the driver and tracking for the parents at home or work via an app. They can also, where allowed by collec- tive bargaining, be used as driver time clocks. That’s the internet of things. More and more school buses are equipped with
high-definition surveillance cameras that automatically transmit recordings to office staff via Wi-Fi when the bus enters the transportation yard. The video, along with all sorts of other data, can then be stored and shared via cloud computing, which no longer necessitates complicated and costly onsite server storage. A host of providers offer inexpensive cloud storage options that come with automatic backups and redundancy. Again, internet of things. Wi-Fi is also enabling students to extend learning time to the bus, as was seen en masse during the pandemic lockdowns. Internet of things.
Technology in the Driver’s Seat These examples merely scratch the surface of what is
or soon will be possible for student transporters turned technologists. That realization is not lost on Dayton Pub- lic Schools in Ohio, which is responsible on any given day for transporting about 11,000 students on 185 route buses. Nearly all students are eligible to ride the school bus. “That’s a lot to manage because there are a lot of ex-
tenuating circumstances,” commented Rob Gifford, the district’s IT analyst charged with integrating the Tyler Technologies transportation suite and moving all data to the cloud. This includes Student Transportation, the new name for Traversa routing software. “How do we route, what do we route, who do we route,
what kids go in, what kids come out … keeping that up to date is extremely challenging,” Gifford continued. “And I don’t know if it can ever be 100-percent perfect, but that is definitely one of my goals.” Routing certainly is more efficient by pushing trips to the Tyler Drive tablet rather than printing out countless number of route sheets. Gifford likened the old way to “killing thousands of trees.” Jennifer Turner, Dayton’s director of routing, dispatch and call center, commented that previously drivers
56 School Transportation News • SEPTEMBER 2022
would ask for a new route sheet each morning. “The amount of paper we’ve dropped, I couldn’t tell
you numbers, but it’s been significant,” she explained, adding that her staff continues to print only one master copy of all routes, but each driver has their own version on the Tyler Drive tablet. LaToya Ware, the district’s new logistics specialist
working on routes, previously was a school bus driver for five years. She is a fan of Tyler Drive, which also eases the pre-trip inspection and reduces bus paperwork. But it’s the map function that she is most enamored with. “As I was getting turned around somewhere, I could
easily zoom in and out on the map to help me out,” she recounted last month. “It just made it a whole lot easier for me just having [the tablet] talk to me rather having something in my hand I had to look at. [And] sometimes when it’s dark, you can’t see street signs or addresses.” Alas, the internet of things can also make operations
safer. Because today’s tablets from a host of providers often come mounted at a state-approved location and the screens are required to go to sleep while the bus is in motion, bus drivers can concentrate better on the road … and the students behind them. And tablets like Tyler Drive are managing the children as
well. Dr. Sheila Burton, Dayton’s associate superintendent of operations and student services, said all school buses now show drivers the faces of each student as they board to not only verify for parents using the My Ride K-12, for- merly known as Ride 360, app or website that their children successfully loaded the bus but also for the drivers that the student is on the correct bus to begin with. Dayton completed the installation of the readers at the
end of last school year, said Gifford. This also entailed exporting all student photos to ID cards needed for swiping upon entry. In total, Burton said Tyler is helping the district meet
its key performance indicator, or KPI, of on-time arrival at school sites. Another use of Tyler Drive is to conduct driver pre- and post-trip inspections. Drivers can denote defects and submit them to maintenance staff. Meanwhile, Gifford said drivers can use separate web portals into the Faster asset management system to create work orders and request new parts, such as window wipers. Over the summer, he managed the migration to an
online parts systems using FasterWin, the web version of the asset management and inventory system, from the previous local-hosted server. This will allow Dayton to better track preventive maintenance needs, costs and labor, all additional KPIs. Gifford added that 100 percent of the district fleet passed the state inspections last year conducted by the Ohio Highway Patrol. The district also uses a DVR system with four channels
from REI. Gifford said staff must manually pull the hard drives but on his wishlist is to obtain the ability to auto-
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
