Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the School Transportation Tracking topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
College Station ISD transportation staff report rollout of StopFinder tracking app and student bus-pass IDs
Summary
Transportation staff described the district’s implementation of Transfinder’s StopFinder real-time tracking app, student bus-pass ID badges and tablet-based driver tools, and gave current registration and ridership counts.
College Station ISD transportation staff told the board at a Sept. 16 workshop that the district has rolled out the StopFinder real-time tracking app and student bus-pass identification system to improve safety, communication and route management.
Staff said the StopFinder app provides parents with real-time arrival and departure information, geofencing alerts, and customizable notifications. "It sends them notifications for when the bus arrives at their stop, when they depart, and when they get to the school," a transportation presenter told trustees.
The district issues a bus-pass badge to each registered student for 2025–26; the badges include the student photo, name and ID and can serve as a temporary school ID if needed. Staff said badges are issued after parents register for transportation; the district has printed roughly 7,000 bus-pass IDs (a combination of batch-printed IDs from previous registrations plus about 1,500 produced in-transportation since the start of the school year).
The presenter described an in-bus tablet that drivers use to scan students on and off. The tablet displays green when a student is expected at that stop and red when a student is not assigned to that bus, providing an immediate cue to drivers. Staff also said the tablet includes tools for drivers to report maintenance issues and to record vehicle trouble reports that create work orders for the shop.
Staff reported current metrics: 14,042 students districtwide; 4,363 registered for bus service in the system; 3,668 daily bus riders (morning count reported on the day of the workshop); and 3,343 parents actively using the StopFinder app. Staff noted roughly 124 students were being transported who were not registered in the system and said transportation staff have contacted families to resolve registration gaps.
The presenter explained that geofence alerts trigger when a bus enters a parent-defined geofence (for example, a neighborhood entrance), but that automatic "late" notifications are not produced by the app — instead, staff manually send district-wide late notices when buses run substantially behind schedule.
Board members asked about funding. Staff said the StopFinder rollout began as a pilot funded from the transportation general fund last year and was fully funded in the current transportation budget; it is not part of a restricted safety grant.
Transportation staff said they will continue training campus staff and drivers on correct badge use and will push registration and app adoption to improve parent communications and ridership data.
