USD 457 starting bus tracking system for student riders

Every Garden City student who rides the school bus will be provided a card to use to scan as they get on and off the school bus so they electronically sign-in and sign-out from the bus starting the 2018-19 school year.  Each student will receive their card from their school bus driver on August 20^th.  The district will start using the cards during the first full week of school.  This will allow for all new student riders to receive a card to have access to ride the school bus.

Students will be expected to have the card with them each day to have access to ride the school bus.  Students will not be denied to ride the bus if they do not have their card, but they will be expected to purchase a replacement card if their card has been damaged, lost or stolen.  The fee for a replacement card is $5 and must be purchased at the USD 457 Transportation Department or through their bus driver.  Garfield Early Childhood Center students will not be issued a card to carry.  Their driver will keep the cards and scan the students on and off the bus.

Each of the district’s school buses already has GPS tracking and cameras on board. Parents will now be able access via any smartphone, tablet or computer that is connected to the internet to check on their child to see the location of the school bus and its estimated arrival or drop off time.  The parents will have a distinctive user name and password, provided by the district, so only they can access the application for their child.

The program will display the school bus’s location on a map, as well as the estimated time of arrival to a specific student’s bus stop. The school bus’s location is automatically updated every five seconds.  The estimated time of arrival of the bus is recalculated to accommodate any delays due to traffic while in route.

The program has a number of additional functions, including an alert function that will inform parents if there is any delay in the route or temporary changes in their child’s bus number.  Parents will also receive notifications alerting them to changes in the bus schedule and district-wide announcements.

For more information about the app and how parents can access the information, contact the district’s transportation department at 620-805-8750.