WALKER, Mich. — Gynelle Miller signed up for her school district's bus tracking app as soon as she saw an email from the district.
"I think it's nice that Comstock Park is investing in both the safety and security of our kids and also the technology component because people are living on their phones, so it's nice to have that ability," she notes.
The app, My Ride K-12, is in its first-year rollout in Comstock Park Public Schools. It's a student tracking system that transforms how families navigate the daily choreography of school transportation.
Where parents once stood anxiously peering down empty streets, wondering if the bus had already come and gone, they now glance confidently at their smartphones, watching a digital dot creep closer to their neighborhood with minute-by-minute precision.
"This is all for the parents," Trevor Bulmer, transportation director for Comstock Park Public Schools, his voice carrying the weight of someone who understands the invisible anxieties that come with putting your child on a school bus each morning. "Being a parent myself, I wanted something that would help out the parents. Peace of mind."
Each student carries a small RFID fob—a device no larger than a key chain—containing nothing more than eight alphanumeric characters assigned specifically to them. No personal information, no privacy concerns, just a unique identifier that opens a window into their daily journey.
When students board their bus, they tap their fob against a reader mounted near the driver. Instantly, a tablet displays the student's name, address, and photo, allowing the driver to verify the student is on the correct bus. The system knows where each child should be, and more importantly, where they shouldn't be.
"If a student boards the bus from their designated school and they badge on, the tablet will make an alert sound, letting us know that this student's not supposed to be on this bus," Bulmer details. "It will tell the driver, 'Hey, this student needs to be on bus 24.'"
The same vigilance applies at dismissal. When students attempt to disembark at the wrong stop, the system intervenes, preventing a child from getting off at the wrong apartment complex or neighborhood—unless, of course, parents have notified the district of alternative arrangements.
For the roughly 1,370 students who ride Comstock Park buses daily, this technological safety net operates invisibly, but for parents, it provides something invaluable: visibility into their child's commute.
Gynelle Miller knows the value of that visibility intimately. Living a quarter-mile from her children's bus stop down a tree-lined road that obscures any view of approaching buses, Miller found herself caught in the familiar parent trap of rushed mornings and uncertain timing.
"Having (the app) really helps with the morning rush," Miller explains. "I can see if they're on time, early or late, and then same with pickup."
The app has eliminated those twenty-minute waits at the bus stop when buses run behind schedule, and it's ended the guessing game that used to define her children's transportation routine. Instead of the old system of hoping and waiting, Miller can check the app twenty minutes before the normal pickup time, track the bus's progress along its route, and time her children's departure accordingly.
"We get about ten minutes till we need to get down there, so it really helps gauge that time" she says with the knowing laugh of a parent who has lived through countless frantic morning departures.
Currently, just shy of 300 parents use the app daily—a number Bulmer hopes will grow, particularly among middle and high school families who have been slower to adopt the technology. Elementary parents have embraced the system enthusiastically, recognizing its value for children who lack cell phones and independent communication capabilities.
The impact extends beyond convenience. Bulmer reports a "fairly good decrease in phone calls" since the app's implementation—fewer frantic inquiries about bus locations, fewer concerns about missed pickups, fewer interruptions to the transportation department's daily operations.
For a two-person operation—Bulmer and dispatcher Mercedes—managing communication for nearly 1,400 daily riders, that reduction in calls represents significant operational relief.
The cost of the system is $60,000 to $70,000 for initial setup in a district Comstock Park's size—but parents pay nothing to access the app. It's a complete investment by the district in family peace of mind.
The technology requires parents to authenticate their access through three separate verifiers: student ID, birth date, and last name. Only then can they access real-time information about their child's location and transportation status.
The district can also push communications directly to parents through the app—notifications about delays, weather-related schedule changes, or mechanical issues that might affect pickup times.
Bulmer sees this as just the beginning. With AI technology advancing and facial recognition systems becoming more sophisticated, he anticipates even more seamless solutions on the horizon.
"Usually, busing has been the last one to get any new technology, and I see it coming faster," he says. "It's exciting which direction we're heading into."
The system has had its challenges. Students lose fobs—they are children, after all—and Bulmer has experimented with various attachment methods, from traditional lanyards to retractable versions. He's even exploring RFID stickers that could attach to students' phones, recognizing the one item teenagers never seem to misplace.
"Students don't lose their phones," he observes with practical wisdom.
This story was initially reported by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
