New AI technology on Canyons School District buses aims to improve student safety

SANDY — As the 2024-25 school year gets underway, the Canyons School District is rolling out a new GPS and artificial intelligence-powered safe driving system.

The system, powered by Samsara, can detect if a driver is ill, injured, or distracted and within seconds alert district officials.

“We can tell what’s wrong with the bus mechanically through Samsara, it will recognize if the driver is being distracted, whether he’s looking away from the road, it will recognize if the driver is on the cell phone, it will recognize if the driver makes too harsh of a break or too harsh of a turn,” said Matthew Curtis, dispatch coordinator for the Canyons School District.

Over the past week, drivers in the district have been getting familiar with the new AI technology that was installed on all 189 buses. Each bus was already equipped with multiple cameras, but now the program is synchronized so that the AI can begin to build a profile on each driver.

“We have a camera on our driver at all times, it is watching the driver, it is seeing what they’re doing, it starts to recognize who that driver is,” Curtis said.

Currently, when a driver gets onto a Canyons School District bus, they log onto the program through a tablet mounted near the steering wheel. Over time, that will change.

“Eventually as the year goes along, it will start to recognize the driver and log the driver in automatically as they get onto the bus,” Curtis said.

Instant notification

Now that the program is operational, as concerns about driving behaviors are detected, an alert will be sent to several officials in the district’s transportation department.

“It’s within 2 seconds of them holding the cell phone that we get an alert,” Curtis said.

From there, the concerning behavior will be addressed with the driver, and over time the district will use the data gathered from the program to improve training.

“We do a lot of training, we do a lot of recertification on drivers, but now that we have the ability to know what we need to train better in, now we can focus on how to make this the safest ride to school,” Curtis said.

Also new this year, the district will be using Wayfinder, a GPS program that allows for all bus routes to be pre-programed. The district says this will really help new drivers or drivers who fill-in to more safely navigate their route.

“Last year, we had drivers drive with paper maps,” Curtis said.

The new GPS and AI powered technology cost the district approximately $500,000. For Curtis, it’s a necessary expense to improve safety for not only the students in the district but for bus drivers too.

“Safety of our students is our number one goal, it’s the most precious commodity we can carry,” Curtis said. “We are able to safely transport our students better when we know what our drivers are doing.”