The Greene County School District is getting ready to roll out a new feature for students that ride a bus.

Superintendent Brett Abbotts tells Raccoon Valley Radio parents and guardians will soon have access to a free app with Stopfinder that will give a live location of where their child’s bus is at.

“That information only gets shared with specific users who are identified already in our student information system. But it’ll just allow them to feel a sense of comfort of knowing, as long as their student gets on the correct bus, where their bus is at, how long it’s going to take them to get there, and when they can expect kind of a safe arrival. It will also double over for our student athletes or those that are traveling for activities.”        

The district plans to get this new program out to parents and guardians in two phases. The initial phase, due to happen on January 30th, will be parents receiving an email from the district to invite them to download the app with Stopfinder. Once that happens, parents can see their child’s bus number, bus stop and pick up and drop off times. The second phase will be to install GPS devices on each of the 15 buses for parents to be able to see where the buses are while en route. 

The district notes these pick up and drop off times are approximate and there could be several delays including weather, construction, among others. Those students that have specialized transportation will not have routing information with the app. Those families that need to make a busing change, must still contact Jill Lamoureux at 515-386-4168 to make arrangements. 

The School Board approved a three year contract at their December meeting with a $4,500 one-time set up fee, and a $500 annual fee to lease all equipment for all 15 buses. Payment for the system is from the Physical Plant and Equipment Levy (PPEL) fund. 

Click the link below to watch a brief video about this program:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAX9idBPL-s&feature=youtu.be