If you have a child who rides the bus to school, there’s no excuse now for not doing homework on those long trips – or using their cell phone for other things.
The Lincoln County School District has installed WiFi connection kits on 88 First Student buses used by the district. The connections are now available to any student who wishes to use their time on the bus to be connected to the internet, the district said in a news release Monday.
“We felt it was important to offer this service to our students who need access and ability to use the time they have commuting to and from school to complete assignments,” said Sarah Monroe, the district’s transportation supervisor who worked with First Student. “This will be especially useful for our students who are traveling long distances or to games and activities.”
The 88 kits cost the district $91,480 for 12 months of Wifi connections. The district is seeking reimbursement from the federal government.
The WiFi service is provided by Kajeet, with the dual connection of AT&T and Verizon networks. This will allow the WiFi connection to automatically switch to the provider that has the best coverage as the bus travels throughout the county. There are filter and access settings in place that are compliant and can be further managed by the school district’s technology department. The password is “smartbus” for all buses.
