GPS Tracking ROI

The Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) has prepared a model for the implementation of RFID technology. It will very soon come up with RFID-enabled ID cards for the students. For which, it is testing a system called BusPass which combines RFID and GPS. The combo will track the students when they are boarding the school bus and getting off.

For the safety and security of some 60,000 students of 120 schools, the district has decided to install RFID technology. By using this latest technology, the district would inform the parents about the arrival of school bus via text phone messages or e-mail alerts. It will also tell them whether their child has missed the bus…. Full Article Here:

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve tried to get a school board or school district to look at a plan like this, I’d be a rich man living in a villa in the Philippines, sipping a mai tai.

Children are without question our most valuable asset and school leadership is the only agency who actually gets paid to take care of children. How much is it reasonable to spend on one student for tracking? Well, let that student go missing and then answer that question for me.

The combination of RF-ID tags on a per student basis and GPS tracking to log their travel son school busses is a fantastic safety idea. Basically, we do this:

• Issue each child a durable RF-ID tag that will be kept on the student’s person
• Put an RF-ID reader on each school bus
• GPS track each school bus
• Put a reader (even better an RF-ID operated lock) on each school door used by students

We now have what?

• Accountability for the student while they are the school board’s responsibility … from when they get picked dup until they are properly delivered.
• Known ridership and control of bus routes.
• Proof that the bus made its pickup at the proper time.
• Unequivocal records that prove the bus driver:

• operated safely
• got to school at the proper time
• didn’t idle excessively,
• Used stop arms and flashers properly

A system like this can be implanted for about the cost of single purpose child on board systems or other non-integrated solutions. It can easily pay for itself on efficiency alone.

Thinking of the money available from state and federal governments for All these tasks and the huge liabilities inherit in school board’s day to day operation the wonderment to me is not that a progressive distinct is piloting the system, the wonder is that it’s not mandatory today, everywhere.

Like the great school bus seatbelt controversy, the general lack of foresight and protective systems such as this is just evidence to me that those who are supposed to be dedicated to our children are dedicated to their pocket book instead. My hat is off to the TUSD for their willingness to break the mold and if anyone else wants to take responsibility in their school district, I’d be glad to help.

Unaware the bus had an assignment that day, he called the dispatcher who claimed the vehicle was in the bus parking lot. As it turns out, a substitute driver mistakenly had taken the wrong bus on a field trip and AWARE was able to pinpoint its exact location….

Original Article Here:

Well it isn’t as if GPS tracking for school busses was new, but the acceptance has really been poor, considering the broad base of school districts and private contractors who carry students across the world.  Of course, especially here in the US, the reason there are so many entities engaged in this service, often wastefully passing each other as they go about their routs is a story for another day.

As a private entrepreneur I have approached many school districts with the idea of GPS tracking their busses, always to little or no interest. In spite of offers to prove savings upon their own fleets there is no one literally interested enough is school bus safety to actually take a free trial evaluation offer. It’s much easier in a public service job to sit back in the swivel chair and whine about not having enough money. Of course the fact that the GPS could actually afford a net savings … meaning more money in the district’s coffers seems to fall on deaf ears. There’s an old business saying that you have to spend money to make money. I would submit that a paraphrase is also true; you have to expend a little effort to make money also.

Now that Cummins, one of the leading purveyors of engines and Bluebird, perhaps the biggest US school bus manufacturers are now including GPS systems as an option will help sway the market.

I included a paragraph above illustrating one of the most denied aspects of GPS tracking. There may or may not be wrong-doing involved with vehicles not being where they are supposed to be, but the truth of the matter is, vehicle managers in the pupil transportation industry (as well in every other industry and government industry I have performed demonstrations for) simply do not know where their vehicles are.

It does not matter if the unknown trips and locations are benign or malicious, it takes a manager to decide … you can’t yet program some kind of “expert system” to make these sorts of decisions, and the best manager in the world can not make correct decisions if the assets managed are not measured.

Investigate the optional systems from the big manufacturers, investigate third-party systems, but whatever you do, do something!

Our children’s safety is of prime importance and. as a side benefit, while protecting the children, you’ll definitely improve your bottom line.