Mom I Missed the Bus!

Christian Baumgarth
Economos
AP English Language
18 October 2012

          A frequent occurrence in Cobb County is that of parents complaining about buses not coming to pick up their children. When this happens, the school is required to send a bus back out to that stop and get the child and bring them to school. They are required to do so because they have no way of knowing if the child simply missed the bus or if the bus did not show up at the stop that morning. This is costing schools money in gas for the buses and in paying overtime to the bus drivers. So some schools have developed a solution.
         
          Some schools have decided to put GPS trackers in their school buses. This includes some schools in Fulton, Henry, and Clayton counties as well as Cobb. This allows them to track where the bus is at any point in time so that the school knows if the bus has missed a stop. If the child simply missed the bus, then the school is not required to send a bus back to get the child. So these GPS trackers could be saving the school systems money on the extra fuel and overtime they are paying the drivers.
         
          However, will these trackers actually benefit the school systems? The schools in the counties that have started using the GPS trackers predict that they will save up to 1.2 million dollars annually compared to the almost 600 thousand dollars the GPS systems will cost. Also the counties have informed the media that there have been less parent complaints since they installed the GPS trackers.
         
          Not everything, however, is fine and dandy. The bus drivers themselves are particularly not fond of the new systems. They claim that this gives the school a weapon against bus drivers who speed, drive recklessly, or do not arrive at the school on time. The schools, however, claim that they will not use this new technology against the drivers personally and they hope to work out any issues with the drivers personally. The school systems hope that the GPS trackers will help keep children safer on their way to school and save a little money while they're at it.    
         

Burnette II, Daarel. "The Atlanta Journal Constitution." Atlanta Journal Constitution. (2012): n. page. Web. 18 Oct. 2012. <http://www.ajc.com/news/news/local/gps-system-tracks-local-school-buses/nSgWF/>.