Vehicle Routing and Transportation Management Software

School transportation routes and therefore costs will change at the start of the 2012 - 2013 school year.  If your child is enrolled at a primary school, you should read this very important information. 

As School District and Department of Education policies can vary in how they deal with transportation cuts we are using California as an example.  If you need information from a specific school district we can add links, as requested.  Bus schedules and routes will be changing nationwide, the following is a review of some of the expected changes.

California Governor Brown's budget which cuts school transportation costs has left parents and schools extremely worried. The Department of Education thinks the best way to deal with the cuts is to increase school bus fees for those who pay and change the eligibility of those who normally get to ride the bus for free. It seems that they think doing this will reduce the number of children riding the bus. Meaning many students will need to walk, cycle or be driven to school.

If your child is eligible to ride on the school bus through CSR, (Corporate Social Responsibility), they no longer will be because the CSR will no longer be available. 

The California State Board of Education approved plan for school transportation costs 2012-2013;

School bus transportation is one of the main forms of mass transit in the United States. This transportation program provides great savings in fuel costs as large numbers of students ride in one school bus as opposed to small numbers of students riding in cars. School buses are also one of the safest forms of transportation available.

GPS vehicle tracking has become a popular way for employers to monitor employees who's job depends on driving and for the parents of teenage drivers to monitor where the teens are driving. There are a few pros and cons to using vehicle tracking through a GPS system. 

For those that don't know, SIF is an acronym for Schools Interoperability Framework.  SIF is a specifications that defines how software applications for K-12 school systems exchange data.

Every day you trust them with the lives of your children.  There are approximately 480,000 buses transporting students.  This means there are at least 480,000 bus drivers.  In reality, there is more than that because each school district needs substitute bus drivers.  With half a million drivers, there’s likely to be some that are better than others.  On average, each bus transports approximately 50 students.

Every day we trust school bus drivers all across the country to safely transport our children to and from school and any programs in between.  Most of us probably never give it a second thought. I just read an article that explains how a 17 year old passenger on a school bus prevented a traffic accident which would certainly have resulted in passenger injuries or maybe even deaths.

School buses are big.  Really big! Whenever a school bus needs to turn around, especially when backing up, the potential for an accident is a lot higher.  There are quite a few blind spots at the back of the bus that could prevent the driver from seeing a parked car or even a child.

Nobody likes to think about accidents or medical emergencies, especially when you’re also thinking about school buses and students.  Accidents do happen.  Medical emergencies do happen.  It’s important that we prepare for them.  One important thing you can do is to make sure you have details of each student’s special medical conditions on the school bus.

When a student misbehaves on a school bus they cause a distraction for the bus driver leading to a potentially unsafe situation.  School districts have policies regarding behaviors on the school bus, but it is important that this information is tracked so those policies can properly be enforced.

In a previous post, I talked about registered sex offenders that may live near your child’s bus stop "Are There Sex Offenders Near My Child's School Bus Stop". This is important to know, but it doesn’t mention other threats that may exist for your children.