Scary school bus incident and safety petition

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
So where is Ms. Serino in all this? Why are the assistant Principals doing what is usually her job?

Let's play:
A. Off for staff appreciation week
B. Vacation
C. Administrative leave after this incident
D. Was told not to comment (lawsuit etc)
E. About to leave position, whatevs
F. None of the above

[Anonymous]

Ask your children their bus route # (take a photo if they have a phone on them), AND jot down (or take photo) of bus number (typically longer number than routr number, tho thst could vary by cluster). Last Friday, our kid took same bus they do home, but the route # posted on window was a different # and they said bus # was different than usual bus too. A poster asked what bus # this route 1113 was last Friday, this Monday and today. If OP or another family of kid riding this knows, please post. How do we know that that bus from Friday was taken out as MCPS claims it was but then we are now hearing of bus "overheating".

[Anonymous]

Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

That's standard procedure with a bus malfunction.

[Anonymous]

So many ignorant comments that really scare me. This is a solution if you are so scare that your child ride a MCPS bus take it yourself to school, easy way!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So many ignorant comments that really scare me. This is a solution if you are so scare that your child ride a MCPS bus take it yourself to school, easy way!

And where do you take your child? To a building run by the same people that expose children to antifreeze and then just hose them off and send them to class. What's your solution to administrators who won't keep children safe?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child was on the bus; it was definitely a bad situation but she was/is fine.

In response to some specific points made-
1) my child did call us and we picked her up, took her home to shower and didn’t make her go back. Am sure she would have been allowed to use a school phone if she didn’t have her own.
2) I got an email that day 5/3 at 9:43 am from assistant principal Bryant with subject “Bus 1113 incident at school this morning”. Am not sure why people are saying the school tried to hide the incident. Email was to “Westland Middle Recipients” which I assume included families of all Westland students.

I signed the petition and there are still big problems to solve here. The bus should absolutely have been taken out of service immediately. But I wanted to clear up that misinformation.

No on the email to all families. I have a kid at Westland, check all emails hourly (and spam once a day) and did not receive any communications about this issue.

I am incensed that the assistant Principal did not see fit to explain what had happened to the community at large.

I truly don’t think this is a community-wide issue. As long as the families of the kids involved were notified promptly, there’s no need for a blanket message. My kid has been on buses involved in fender-benders and mechanical malfunctions over the years, and I didn’t think the whole school needed to be notified.

This was a pretty dramatic malfunction, to be sure, but it’s one that’s highly unlikely to be repeated, and didn’t affect anyone else at the school. The people who needed to know, knew. I’d much rather the school keep communications to the essentials, so information is less likely to get lost in the deluge.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

That's standard procedure with a bus malfunction.

No it is not when student has been exposed. Even the health room calls when kid pees in their pant and they already have a change of clothes at school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child was on the bus; it was definitely a bad situation but she was/is fine.

In response to some specific points made-
1) my child did call us and we picked her up, took her home to shower and didn’t make her go back. Am sure she would have been allowed to use a school phone if she didn’t have her own.
2) I got an email that day 5/3 at 9:43 am from assistant principal Bryant with subject “Bus 1113 incident at school this morning”. Am not sure why people are saying the school tried to hide the incident. Email was to “Westland Middle Recipients” which I assume included families of all Westland students.

I signed the petition and there are still big problems to solve here. The bus should absolutely have been taken out of service immediately. But I wanted to clear up that misinformation.

No on the email to all families. I have a kid at Westland, check all emails hourly (and spam once a day) and did not receive any communications about this issue.

I am incensed that the assistant Principal did not see fit to explain what had happened to the community at large.

I truly don’t think this is a community-wide issue. As long as the families of the kids involved were notified promptly, there’s no need for a blanket message. My kid has been on buses involved in fender-benders and mechanical malfunctions over the years, and I didn’t think the whole school needed to be notified.

This was a pretty dramatic malfunction, to be sure, but it’s one that’s highly unlikely to be repeated, and didn’t affect anyone else at the school. The people who needed to know, knew. I’d much rather the school keep communications to the essentials, so information is less likely to get lost in the deluge.

So insensitive. Your kid doesn't ride a bus right? EVERY parent has a right to know. It may have been ONE bus last Friday but there are hundreds of buses in MCPS transporting students. And where is the oversight of the buses and bus drivers? The BOE? Cris Cram? Old Supers? New interim super? Your mom?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

That's standard procedure with a bus malfunction.

No it is not when student has been exposed. Even the health room calls when kid pees in their pant and they already have a change of clothes at school.

What did you want them to do, just sit on the side of some road? What if the parents couldn't be reached? What if they were an hour away? Taking them to the school is fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child was on the bus; it was definitely a bad situation but she was/is fine.

In response to some specific points made-
1) my child did call us and we picked her up, took her home to shower and didn’t make her go back. Am sure she would have been allowed to use a school phone if she didn’t have her own.
2) I got an email that day 5/3 at 9:43 am from assistant principal Bryant with subject “Bus 1113 incident at school this morning”. Am not sure why people are saying the school tried to hide the incident. Email was to “Westland Middle Recipients” which I assume included families of all Westland students.

I signed the petition and there are still big problems to solve here. The bus should absolutely have been taken out of service immediately. But I wanted to clear up that misinformation.

No on the email to all families. I have a kid at Westland, check all emails hourly (and spam once a day) and did not receive any communications about this issue.

I am incensed that the assistant Principal did not see fit to explain what had happened to the community at large.

I truly don’t think this is a community-wide issue. As long as the families of the kids involved were notified promptly, there’s no need for a blanket message. My kid has been on buses involved in fender-benders and mechanical malfunctions over the years, and I didn’t think the whole school needed to be notified.

This was a pretty dramatic malfunction, to be sure, but it’s one that’s highly unlikely to be repeated, and didn’t affect anyone else at the school. The people who needed to know, knew. I’d much rather the school keep communications to the essentials, so information is less likely to get lost in the deluge.

This is a huge mistake that parents like you and MCPS make repeatedly. It is a community-wide issue because a large group of kids like this are a part of the community. And they're going to share their experiences with the community and that narration of a child is going to be subject to misperceptions and misstatements which WILL get out into the community and lead to confusion or misinformation spreading to parents. So you should address it to the community so that way you get out in front of the rumor mill and have an official, clear, accurate message circulating and to point to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

That's standard procedure with a bus malfunction.

No it is not when student has been exposed. Even the health room calls when kid pees in their pant and they already have a change of clothes at school.

What did you want them to do, just sit on the side of some road? What if the parents couldn't be reached? What if they were an hour away? Taking them to the school is fine.

It doesn't matter how far away you are and school doesn't know either, but the school should be making phone calls right then asking parents if your emergency contact person can be notified to pick up your kid or if that person can meet your kid at the medical facility until you get to them, NOT be sent to school until parent/caretaker is present. There are people who have not been exposed to that stuff inside the school building. When an accident happens, an EmT is on site to check and asks if the person wants to be taken to hospital. Did the students decline service to a hospital? That's their caregiver's decision.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child was on the bus; it was definitely a bad situation but she was/is fine.

In response to some specific points made-
1) my child did call us and we picked her up, took her home to shower and didn’t make her go back. Am sure she would have been allowed to use a school phone if she didn’t have her own.
2) I got an email that day 5/3 at 9:43 am from assistant principal Bryant with subject “Bus 1113 incident at school this morning”. Am not sure why people are saying the school tried to hide the incident. Email was to “Westland Middle Recipients” which I assume included families of all Westland students.

I signed the petition and there are still big problems to solve here. The bus should absolutely have been taken out of service immediately. But I wanted to clear up that misinformation.

No on the email to all families. I have a kid at Westland, check all emails hourly (and spam once a day) and did not receive any communications about this issue.

I am incensed that the assistant Principal did not see fit to explain what had happened to the community at large.

I truly don’t think this is a community-wide issue. As long as the families of the kids involved were notified promptly, there’s no need for a blanket message. My kid has been on buses involved in fender-benders and mechanical malfunctions over the years, and I didn’t think the whole school needed to be notified.

This was a pretty dramatic malfunction, to be sure, but it’s one that’s highly unlikely to be repeated, and didn’t affect anyone else at the school. The people who needed to know, knew. I’d much rather the school keep communications to the essentials, so information is less likely to get lost in the deluge.

This is a huge mistake that parents like you and MCPS make repeatedly. It is a community-wide issue because a large group of kids like this are a part of the community. And they're going to share their experiences with the community and that narration of a child is going to be subject to misperceptions and misstatements which WILL get out into the community and lead to confusion or misinformation spreading to parents. So you should address it to the community so that way you get out in front of the rumor mill and have an official, clear, accurate message circulating and to point to.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

That's standard procedure with a bus malfunction.

No it is not when student has been exposed. Even the health room calls when kid pees in their pant and they already have a change of clothes at school.

What did you want them to do, just sit on the side of some road? What if the parents couldn't be reached? What if they were an hour away? Taking them to the school is fine.

It doesn't matter how far away you are and school doesn't know either, but the school should be making phone calls right then asking parents if your emergency contact person can be notified to pick up your kid or if that person can meet your kid at the medical facility until you get to them, NOT be sent to school until parent/caretaker is present. There are people who have not been exposed to that stuff inside the school building. When an accident happens, an EmT is on site to check and asks if the person wants to be taken to hospital. Did the students decline service to a hospital? That's their caregiver's decision.

Does the school even know which students are riding on each bus to know whose parents to call?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok so a message was sent out by the school AP asking to bring clothes to school. How did they know parents wanted the children to go to school on a replacement bus? Not understanding why parents were not notified earlier to pick up their kid at whatever location this happened. It was not when the bus reached the school the incident happened.

That's standard procedure with a bus malfunction.

No it is not when student has been exposed. Even the health room calls when kid pees in their pant and they already have a change of clothes at school.

What did you want them to do, just sit on the side of some road? What if the parents couldn't be reached? What if they were an hour away? Taking them to the school is fine.

It doesn't matter how far away you are and school doesn't know either, but the school should be making phone calls right then asking parents if your emergency contact person can be notified to pick up your kid or if that person can meet your kid at the medical facility until you get to them, NOT be sent to school until parent/caretaker is present. There are people who have not been exposed to that stuff inside the school building. When an accident happens, an EmT is on site to check and asks if the person wants to be taken to hospital. Did the students decline service to a hospital? That's their caregiver's decision.

Here is the regulation covering bus accidents:

2. Accident scene responsibilities include the following:
a) The dispatcher, or if the dispatcher is not on duty, the bus operator
ensures that emergency services and an MCPS DOT supervisor are
called to the scene.
b) A bus involved in an accident or collision shall not be moved until
released by a police officer or a DOT supervisor.
c) In compliance with federal transportation standards, MCPS
operators must cooperate with drug testing following any accident
resulting in injury or sufficient damage to necessitate a vehicle being
towed.
3. Notification
a) Accidents must be reported to the dispatcher and police
immediately.
b) The dispatcher will notify appropriate MCPS personnel, including
the Office of the Chief Operating Officer (OCOO) when
appropriate, in accordance with notification procedures.
c) DOT staff will notify the OCOO.
d) Following notification of an accident involving students, the
principal/designee should contact parents/guardians as soon as
possible.
e) If students or staff involved in the accident are hospitalized,
administrative or supervisory personnel from the school and DOT
will be sent to the hospital.


https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/policy/pdf/eeara.pdf