Urban District Unlocks Millions in Transportation Funding

Organization Profile

• Industry: School District
• Location: Allentown, Pennsylvania
• Number of Employees: 3,300
• Students: 17,000+
• Tyler Client Since: 2024
• Tyler Products Used: Student Transportation, My Ride K-12, Enterprise ERP, Content Manager

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Challenges

Allentown School District is the third-largest school district in Pennsylvania, serving more than 17,000 students across 25 buildings. In an urban district with a 1.5-mile walking boundary, most of Allentown’s elementary students were expected to walk to school through busy streets, one-way roads, and alleys that became impassable in heavy snow.

Andrew Krahulik-Knapp, director of transportation, joined the district in 2023 despite hearing how challenging it was from colleagues. “I was at a point where I wanted the challenge. I loved the vision of the Superintendent and what she wanted to do with transportation,” said Krahulik-Knapp, who was charged with shrinking the walking boundary to one mile and expanding bus access.

Designing, implementing, and maintaining operational systems that enhance organizational efficiency and ensure delivery of exceptional service to schools, staff, and families is a goal identified in the district’s Strategic Plan. A 2022-23 internal audit revealed inefficiencies: buses were running single-tier routes with only three or four students on board, mileage was far below what the district’s size warranted, and the state subsidy — tied directly to ridership and mileage efficiency — had stagnated. As a result of the audit findings, the district decided to bring routing in-house. They had relied on a single bus company for over a decade, leaving all routing decisions in the contractor’s hands. The change marked a massive shift in process and mindset for the district.

Solution

In 2024, Allentown School District selected Tyler Technologies’ Student Transportation solution and began building its routing operation from the ground up. Based on 12 years of working with a legacy platform, Krahulik-Knapp knew it wouldn’t support what his new role required. “There were things I needed it to do that it couldn’t,” he said. “But I knew Tyler must have software that did it right.” The ease of assigning exact stop times — something the previous software couldn’t do — sealed the decision. “It just came together very, very quickly,” he said.

The district started with almost no usable data, and implementation was demanding. With a shared commitment to the project’s success, routing specialists from the district’s new contractor joined the training calls alongside the internal team. “It was honestly a lot of sleepless nights,” Krahulik-Knapp said. “But the team at Tyler was great. They really walked us through it hand-in-hand.”

The software’s Fleet Schedule feature became the team’s primary tool for maximizing vehicle use. By viewing all routes simultaneously, Krahulik-Knapp’s team could identify single-tier runs and pair them with other routes to increase efficiency. A 15-minute shift in elementary school start times gave drivers enough time to run these paired routes effectively. “Using that Fleet Schedule feature, we were able to ask, ‘If we just shifted this time by 15 minutes, what could we accomplish?’” he said. “That helped confirm we were making the right decision.”

Results

By bringing routing in-house and increasing visibility and control through Tyler’s Student Transportation software, Allentown has seen significant financial gains. Pennsylvania’s pupil transportation subsidy rewards districts for high ridership and efficient use of mileage. With paired routes and increased ridership, the district has steadily grown its total approved cost — the state metric that determines subsidy.

That figure increased from $2.5 million in 2021-22 to $3.4 million in 2022-23, $4.1 million in 2023-24, and an estimated $6.8 million in 2024-25 — a 170% increase over four years. “Getting half of what we spend on transportation back in state subsidy is a great thing,” Krahulik-Knapp said. “It helps put the money back in the classrooms.”

With that foundation in place, the district is now turning its attention to the parent experience. The district is piloting My Ride K-12, Tyler’s parent communication app, at two elementary schools with a combined ridership of about 200 students. A districtwide rollout is planned for next year. For a district where parents once received bus stop times by phone just four days before school started, this marks a significant shift. “This is going to be a game-changer. We won’t have to call 2,000 parents,” Krahulik-Knapp said. “They’ll be able to get the information all in one place.”

The results at the pilot schools have been encouraging. One participating principal reported that transportation went off without a hitch — buses were consistently on time, and parents got real-time bus ETAs. Her school’s daily attendance rate exceeded 90%, which she credited to reliable transportation. “Our district’s mission is to be more innovative,” Krahulik- Knapp said. “Bringing our transportation to the next level is part of that, and the My Ride K-12 app is going to be crucial.”