Kindergartener got on the wrong bus today

[Anonymous]

My kindergartener's after-school care was closed today, so she had to take a different school bus -- the one that comes home instead of to the after-school care. I emailed the teacher ahead of time and got an email response that she'll be put on the correct bus. Well, when I picked up her at our home bus stop, she was NOT there. We quickly called the school to find out where she was. They were able to locate her within minutes (paged various bus drivers, probably) and said they'll bring her back to the school where I could pick up her. It turned out she got on the wrong bus (went to her usual one to the after-school care instead of taking the one home). I'm thankful that she was unharmed, but am not pleased that this happened at all. The teacher was apologetic, said something about my kid was supposed to go to another room to wait for the bus, but probably got "intercepted" by her usual bus patroller and followed him/her to the "usual" bus by mistake. I'm thinking I'll just let this go, but truly hope that this won't happen again.

What would you do if you were in my situation? Just let this go and attribute it to "one of those things that just happen"?

[Anonymous]

Did your child know about the change? Personally I wouldn't get too upset since they were able to resolve things.

[Anonymous]

OP here -- yes, I repeatedly reminded her of the change, even this AM when I dropped her off at her bus stop...

[Anonymous]

The dirty little secret is that it happens more frequently than we all would like to think. My son wound up on the wrong bus on the first day of K!! It took them the better part of an hour to track him down since they basically had to radio all the buses and figure out which one had an errant passenger (who didn't necessarily know he was on the wrong bus). We were hysterical, but he was fine. In subsequent months and years I saw neighborhood kids miss their stop (reading or goofing around) and other mishaps. We've also had a lot of issues when an on-site afterschool activity was cancelled without notice to parents and kids are sent home unexpectedly.

There's not really anything you can do to ensure that there is never a mistake like this, and in the case of a kid who gets on the wrong bus I really don't think you can blame the school or the teacher. If it's a public school, they cannot personally escort every kid to every bus. The one thing we tried to develop was a protocol for unexpected arrivals at home - here's where you go (x neighbor, y neighbor), here's what you say, as a backup wait in the backyard by the swingset, etc. My oldest is in third grade and it still makes me anxious.

[Anonymous]

Think how lucky you are that every day MoCo offers you the option of your clid taking a bus to an aftercare site.

An alternative is - your child can either take a bus home or have the aftercare site coordinate the transportation.

[Anonymous]

My co-workers have had this happen to them as well, but only once--so take some comfort in that. They haven't made that mistake again. I imagine that it is quite a task getting every kid on the right school bus. Sometimes mistakes are made. The worst thing that happened to a friend is that their child got off in a neighborhood she wasn't from. Thankfully a girl from her school invited her to go home with her and from there she was able to contact her mom.

[Anonymous]

I do not think you should let this go. Luckily, you reacted quickly and the school was able to locate your child in minutes, but one can only imagine the horrible things that could have occurred if your child or anybody else child was let off at the incorrect stop. I suggest you approach the school with constructive ways in which the bus protocol can be improved. For instance, the teacher communicating any bus passenger changes to the bus patrol directly. Placing a big yellow/orange sticker or sign on those children that need to ride a bus different than their regular bus. With these safeguards in place the bus patrol would have known or at least realized your child was boarding the wrong bus.

[Anonymous]

God, that is nerve-wracking. I would have been a mess.

I'm not sure there is much you can do about it, although I would want to write a letter to someone. Probably at MCPS if that's the district, and just express your concerns. I wonder if there is some sort of system they could set up to minimize mistakes like this. I feel for everyone involved, because it's not like when I was a kid. Nobody went home different routes for any reason. Today everything's different. Before care, after care, camps, divorced parents, Grandma providing after care, etc.

There should be a better way to guarantee accurate transportation. That question should be on someone's radar.

[Anonymous]

Take a chill pill..mistakes happen and your child wasn't in any real danger!!! Stop worrying about things that aren't that big of a deal!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not think you should let this go. Luckily, you reacted quickly and the school was able to locate your child in minutes, but one can only imagine the horrible things that could have occurred if your child or anybody else child was let off at the incorrect stop. I suggest you approach the school with constructive ways in which the bus protocol can be improved. For instance, the teacher communicating any bus passenger changes to the bus patrol directly. Placing a big yellow/orange sticker or sign on those children that need to ride a bus different than their regular bus. With these safeguards in place the bus patrol would have known or at least realized your child was boarding the wrong bus.

In our school, K students are never let off a bus unless someone is there waiting for them (they can't just get off and walk down the street to their house). The teacher can only do so much in this situation. She cannot leave a classroom (or bus line) full of kids to escort one child. In my school, I often ask any other adult in the building (special area teacher, aide, etc) to walk a child in this situation to where they need to go. Sometimes there is nobody to help.

[Anonymous]

I'm sorry. I would have been a mess, too!

But at least your child is fine, and they remedied it quickly.

If it happens again . . . well- different story!

Here's to hoping it's a one-time deal.

[Anonymous]

I'm glad your child is ok. Did you leave your child a note in addition to telling her teacher?

Whenever there is a change in our bus schedule (usually for a playdate or an after school activity), my children carry the note with them. This way the bus driver / patrols / adult in the area knows where they should be going.

[Anonymous]

Our school only accepts bus changes with a written note. IMHO if the teacher was going to accommodate with the bus change based on an email she should have printed out the email and taped it up on the wall by the chart of which child goes where on which day of the week. I think the kindergarten parents at our school are also required to keep a "sign" saftey pinned on their child's backpack. If the child is a bus rider, they have a yellow shaped cut out pinned on their backpack with the bus number and stop information. If the child is in on-site after school care they have a different blue cut out pinned on the top of their backpack etc.

For my first grader I send in a (dated) note each time I'm going to pick her up (instead of her riding the bus) and she puts it in the teachers basket when she arrives. The teacher then tapes it up by the door where they have the list of what child goes where in the afternoon. As she exits, they take down the note and hand it to her so she has another reminder and so she can show it to any adult that asks why she is going to a different exit than she normally does. If the bus is more than five minutes late arriving at school, the remaining children are released from their classrooms to the gym to wait. This way the teachers don't get stuck baby sitting a few kids and can get on to their day. (Walkers and car riders are released when school lets out so they don't have the same issue.) Once the kids are in the gym, it is up to the 5th grade safety patrols (with a few adults supervising) to help make sure the children get on the correct bus. I believe lists of what children go on what bus are also posted in the gym.

I think riding a different bus may require advance permission from the office so that would be a note earlier and then a separate "reminder" note to the teacher on the day of the change.

Because MCPS bus drivers have to track kindergarteners on their bus I would expect the school would also need to notify the bus driver of the bus your child was riding home to make sure that they had record of where she was supposed to get off and who was supposed to be meeting her at the bus stop.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kindergartener's after-school care was closed today, so she had to take a different school bus -- the one that comes home instead of to the after-school care. I emailed the teacher ahead of time and got an email response that she'll be put on the correct bus. Well, when I picked up her at our home bus stop, she was NOT there. We quickly called the school to find out where she was. They were able to locate her within minutes (paged various bus drivers, probably) and said they'll bring her back to the school where I could pick up her. It turned out she got on the wrong bus (went to her usual one to the after-school care instead of taking the one home). I'm thankful that she was unharmed, but am not pleased that this happened at all. The teacher was apologetic, said something about my kid was supposed to go to another room to wait for the bus, but probably got "intercepted" by her usual bus patroller and followed him/her to the "usual" bus by mistake. I'm thinking I'll just let this go, but truly hope that this won't happen again.

What would you do if you were in my situation? Just let this go and attribute it to "one of those things that just happen"?

This happens a lot. But I promise it probably won't happen to YOUR child again.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thanks for all your kind input and sympathetic remarks.

So I decided to talk to the teacher yesterday to figure out what went wrong and if there's anything I can do in the future to help prevent this from happening. Turns out that she forgot to mention to the patrol that my kid needed to board a different bus. She had read my email notification, but didn't print it out. I don't blame her (really!) since Monday was open house and she must have been super-busy. I was actually impressed that she was so honest with me. She also promised that this won't happen again.

She suggested, and I will definitely do so in the future, to send in a written note with my child, in addition to emailing her. That way, she can have a paper reminder (in case she forgets to print out the email).

Thanks again everyone!