“ I decided that if I was going to direct this department, I had to really get into the nuts and bolts, just like I do in nutrition,” Roman said.“ It’ s logistics. It’ s systems. It’ s seconds.” Roman didn’ t come up through a traditional transportation pipeline. A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, she worked in college dining and operations before taking over child nutrition services at Lewiston. The school district’ s transportation duties were added to her portfolio when the existing coordinator retired, and thus she inherited a system with no routing software and one retired police officer estimating trip times by memory and hand gestures.“ At that point, all our transportation was based on Excel sheets,” she said.“ I asked how long it took to get from Point A to B, and our employee held up his finger and said,‘ About five minutes.’ I was like,‘ Oh my gosh.’” Her entry into routing software began with a state-sponsored introduction to Transfinder’ s legacy system, Routefinder Pro. She saw immediate potential.“ Everyone else at the training was ready to retire,” she said.“ I looked around and said,‘ This would be really good for a city like ours.’”
UPGRADING TO PLUS Roman’ s early enthusiasm for Transfinder matured into deep operational commitment. The district upgraded from Routefinder Pro to Routefinder PLUS, and embraced the broader Transfinder ecosystem, including adopting Stopfinder for parent communication, Viewfinder for school staff visibility, Formfinder for streamlined requests, and pilottesting the driver app Wayfinder with their contracted provider.“ I think I had less than a 30-second demo of PLUS before I stopped the rep and said,‘ Just get it,’” Roman said.“ We’ re using every aspect we can. I’ m even certified in Routefinder, and so is my assistant director. I think that’ s one of the reasons we’ ve been so successful; we’ ve committed to doing it right.” This robust adoption was not without obstacles. Roman’ s first assistant director resisted the transition, clinging to familiar spreadsheets. But Roman held firm:“ We were in Pro, we’ d moved to PLUS, and I said,‘ We’ re ripping off the Band-Aid.’ It took someone beside me who could see the vision.”
SCALING WITH COMPLEXITY Lewiston’ s transportation challenges are uniquely complex for a city in Maine. A designated refugee resettlement area, the district serves students from more than 80 linguistic backgrounds, with recent influxes from Somalia, Congo, the Philippines, and Portuguesespeaking regions. Some students have never ridden in a vehicle before boarding a school bus.“ We had over 480 students experiencing homelessness last year, and 130 placed in special-purpose schools as far as 90 minutes away,” Roman said.“ We use large buses, minivans, wheelchair vans, and multiple contractors.” This diversity and rapid growth make real-time visibility essential.“ We absolutely need to know about one-way streets, 911 maps, speed limits, and more,” she said.“ I’ d struggle if someone told me tomorrow,‘ We’ re taking away this software.’ I think I’ d cry.”
INTEGRATION AND ADOPTION Despite implementing an advanced system, Roman knew technology wouldn’ t matter without people behind it.“ We didn’ t have routing software before this,” she said.“ So part of my job is to walk into guidance counselor meetings and say,‘ You’ re not sending every parent to me anymore. You have these tools. Let me show you Viewfinder.’”: Her training strategy is based on empowerment“ I tell them,‘ You can’ t break this. Click all the buttons. I’ ll show you how to get back.’” Parents, too, are gradually being brought into the ecosystem via Stopfinder GPS tracking, which was deliberately limited at first to prevent information overload.“ They can log in and see the GPS, but we didn’ t enable direct messaging at the start,” she said.“ It’ s about building familiarity.”
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