Fujitsu Frontech North America has teamed up with T&W Operations, an IT and logistics solutions provider to governments and small businesses, to develop a school children tracking system. The system employs Fujitsu’s contactless palm vein access control system that will be installed in school buses to track the location of children during transportation. The system is unique in that while it is a cloud-based system, it also locally stores tracking data on the bus itself. The system’s public unveiling is taking place today at the Ohio Association for Pupil Transportation Conference and Trade Show in Dublin, Ohio.
Fujitsu Frontech North America has teamed up with T&W Operations, an IT and logistics solutions provider to governments and small businesses, to develop a school children tracking system. The system employs Fujitsu's contactless palm vein access control system that will be installed in school buses to track the location of children during transportation. The system is unique in that while it is a cloud-based system, it also locally stores tracking data on the bus itself. The system's public unveiling is taking place today at the Ohio Association for Pupil Transportation Conference and Trade Show in Dublin, Ohio.
“We looked at other methods of verifying student location and safety, but chose the Fujitsu palm vein access control system due to its high level of accuracy and ease of use in a bus environment,” said Beau Bowden, President of T&W. “Over the next 12 months, we plan on demonstrating the solution at a number of regional and national education conferences.”
The biometric palm vein sensors use a near-IR light to capture a user's palm vein pattern, generating a unique biometric template that is matched against the palm vein patterns of preregistered users. Unlike other readers, the biometric device does not come into contact with the skin, making it extremely hygienic, nonintrusive and unrestricted by external factors, such as skin types and conditions. Registration for the system takes less than one minute, and authentication takes less than one second.
In 2006, Huntsville, Alabama suffered a tragic accident when a school bus carrying 40 local students fell off a portion of elevated highway. School administrators and parents struggled during the rescue, not knowing which students had been affected. With the new tracking system, schools can now know immediately who is where and notify parents and guardians accordingly. This system offers peace of mind, as well as potentially life-saving information in the case of an emergency, to school administrators and bus operators.