POLK COUNTY, Fla. — Leaders at Polk County Public Schools are working to provide parents more peace of mind as they send their kids off to school each day.
Approximately 50,000 students ride Polk County Public Schools buses to and from school every day.
“You don't know, did they get to school okay? Is everything okay on the bus? Did something happen? Was there an accident?” said Karyna Valdez.
The district is now working to ease some of those concerns.
The school board will vote on whether to spend $920,000 for a school bus tracking system created by Reaxium. The technology allows students to scan their ID badge when getting on the school bus. This lets the district see which students are on buses and if they’re getting on the right one.
"If a child is trying to get on a bus that's not their bus, it will let the driver know, red flag, there's something going on here. The bus driver or attendant will get them to the right school bus," said Rob Davis, Assistant Superintendent of Support Services.
Parents will be able to use a mobile app to see how far away their child’s bus is, what time their child logs on and off the bus and route information.
“To be able to know and track and see, they’re okay, they’re at point B. It will definitely ease a parents mind for sure,” Valdez.
The school district is currently testing out the system on 10 buses that serve its center schools, which includes some of the district’s most fragile students.
"If there were a group of students that we wanted to really prioritize this with, it should be our special needs students who have significant physical impairments or cognitive disabilities but in addition to that, it should be our pre-k and kindergarten students," said Frederick Heid, Superintendent of Polk County Public Schools
Teresa Macedo has a son with special needs and says tracking his school bus would be reassuring.
“Students with special needs need more attention. I don’t have any problems at this time but it’s a good idea for schools,” Macedo said.
The program would also electronically count student ridership, the labor-intensive task is currently done by hand.
“They have to take daily counts of student ridership and report that to the state for funding,” said Heid.
If the school board approves, the bus tracking system could be implemented in time for the beginning of next school year.
