New Bus Routing System Approved

Mountain View School District will introduce a new bus routing system that allows buses to be tracked via an app. The board approved the purchase Oct. 11, along with several facility additions and upgrades.

The bus system will use an app called Traversa Ride 360. Once a student gets on the bus, he or she will be logged in with an ID number. The school can track buses to see their exact location and where each student got on and off.

Parents can also use it to track their child's bus. They will need a current student ID number to log in and use the app.

The system will also produce data that will help the schools determine the most efficient routes. It will cost a little more than $20,000 for start-up equipment the first year and a little more than $9,000 every year after.

Other projects approved by the board include new football stadium lighting at Mountain View, a new food pantry building, a new outdoor classroom building at Rural Special, and heat and air in Rural Special and Timbo gyms.
Much of the cost of these projects will be funded by Elementary & Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) money, said Cindy Smith, ESSER and facilities coordinator.

Supt. Brent Howard told the board that Entergy had inspected all the stadium lighting and said a couple of the poles are not safe. An upgrade of four 70-foot steel poles, 52 stadium lights and all necessary equipment will cost $437,000. However, because of the subsidy the school is getting for the solar project, they have a surplus of what would normally be paid for electricity, Smith said. By applying that to the lighting project it will cost the school only $7,000 a year to pay for the lighting.

See full story in the Oct. 20 issue.