I'm reading Free Range Kids: How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children by Leonore Skenazy that talks about this very issue. She makes a very persuasive agreement that children are actually statistically safer today and a little freedom makes a real difference to our children.

Of course, a number of of bounds kids who attend our local elementary school take the metro to school by themselves . . .

We wait with our first grader for the bus in the mornings. Sometimes the other parents will leave their kids if I am there (or I will send my kid down with another parent). We let him walk home from the bus stop after school because it's at the end of the street. I guess I don't feel comfortable with him waiting there alone because the bus may be late.

Where I grew up, we walked to school about 2 miles, and nobody thought twice about it…

My kids are 1st and 3d grade. They are the only kids at their bus stop. The bus stop is about 3 long blocks from our house, and is not at all visible from our house. They only ride in the pm. I have always met their bus. On Friday after my kids were off the bus and in my car, a truck I recognized as being a periodic visitor to the house next door to the bus stop began to follow me. (The house next to the bus stop has always made me a bit “on alert” in that there are random people and vehicles constantly coming and going from it…)

Instead of driving straight home, I decided to take the long way to see if it was really following us. It was, and it followed us through a very circuitous route over the course of about 10 minutes throughout our town… never flashing its lights, but definitely following us. By now, my destination was the police station. I was half-hoping the truck would keep up with me all the way but I “lost him” a few blocks from the police station. I did not get a license plate number but will when I next see it. I did go to the police, but without the tag number they couldn’t do much.

I informed my kids’ school on Monday morning, given that it happened at a school bus stop. I also told the kids’ bus driver. He knows the house and will get the tag number when/if he sees the truck. School security can’t do anything about it since it did not occur on school property, but they will send an officer out when I meet the bus. If/when I get the tag number in the next few days, I will file a police report.

I will continue to meet my kids at the bus stop until they no longer ride the bus.

I live in a quiet suburban neighborhood and some of the parents there still drive their high schoolers to the bus stop. It baffles me to be honest. It is not a long walk for any of them. I drive my kids to the bus stop but they are 6 and 8 and I leave from the stop to go to work. I agree there can be dangers anywhere but where do you draw the line? FWIW, I grew up in MoCo with a stay at home mother who never waited at the bus stop with us.

I'm not worried about stranger abductions, but people drive VERY fast on the street my kids would have to cross between our house and the bus stop. My kids' heads are often off in the ozone when they walk. It's not a good combination. I ask them when we get to the corner, "OK, is it safe to cross?" and they are so wrapped up in describing what they think should happen in Rick Riordan's new series or bickering about square roots that they have no idea.

They get it from their father.

Anonymous wrote:I agree re times being different - and it being a very relevant difference that there were a lot more SAHM's in our youth. I remember we had a sign in a front window that had a red hand on it which meant that if a child got into trouble he/she should come to our house. Lots of houses with SAHM's had them inthe window. (Don't know if that was a NJ thing or what!) I had a convo with my child the other day re which neighbor's house he should go to if he ever gets locked out of our house, and I could not think of one house on our block where a parent would be home during the day!

In VA the signs had a house with a star(?) in the window.

I also knew which neighbor's house to go to if I ever got locked out. My parents still have keys to 2 different neighbor's houses. One of the kids from down the street came to their house not too long ago to get the key. A lot of houses that have garages also have those keypads to open the door.

I agree re times being different - and it being a very relevant difference that there were a lot more SAHM's in our youth. I remember we had a sign in a front window that had a red hand on it which meant that if a child got into trouble he/she should come to our house. Lots of houses with SAHM's had them inthe window. (Don't know if that was a NJ thing or what!) I had a convo with my child the other day re which neighbor's house he should go to if he ever gets locked out of our house, and I could not think of one house on our block where a parent would be home during the day!

Anonymous wrote:Times have changed. Maybe it is a good thing, not a bad thing? I've seen lots of data to suggest that the crime rate has actually dropped, but maybe it it is our parents who should have been more careful. I used to play in storm sewer tunnels on the way home from school for crying out loud, NOT a good idea. And we had a long-term flasher problem, including a time he came into the girl's bathroom in our school. This was in the 70's in Fairfax. We didn't wear seatbelts either. Unfortunately there are alot of child predators out there. I want my kids to be independent, but I also need to work with the information I have, which is that there are lots of red dots on that sex offenders map in my zip code...

I was just going to say something similar. I grew up in a decent, middle class NJ suburb, in the 80s, and we definitely had a flasher issue. He would stand in a particular area that he knew students walked along. I also want my kids to be independent, but honestly, you have to do what's safe. My current area in MD has lots of things come up on the weekly crime report. I want to be realistic.

I also walked almost a mile to and from school from 1st to 6th grades. I can remember walking home in a blizzard one day they let us out early and my folks weren't home from work. I was one of those poor latch key kids pitied on the other thread.

But we'll definitely make sure someone is going to and from the bus stop with our kids for several years. Don't know what age we'll stop. Will just have to wait and see.

My 4th grader walks to school alone, (CC) as do many many kids in the neighborhood. I didn't think I would let him but everyone else does.

In my neighborhood, a lot of the moms would gather to chat for a bit before the bus came. I don't think it had anything to do with hovering over us. We had a lot of families with kids on our street and there had to be at least 10-12 kids just at my stop.

Many school districts require a parent to be at the stop for Kindergarten kids. If you're not there, they will take the kid back to school.

In MD, children under 8 must be supervised at all times, which tells me they should be met at the bus stop. I have and 8 and 10 and we still go (after all these years we like the other bus stop parents and it is a chance to chat). Next year we will not walk to the MS bus stop with the older one....

17:56 here, I have to agree PP. We wax nostalgic. I've fallen victim to this myself, but then remember the time I was 5 and went to the playground with my brother and a bunch of kids, and a man showed me his penis and made me touch it. Yeah, maybe wouldn't have happened if any of the throngs of kids who were there had a parent present. I also remember the neighbor kids -- you know-- the ones we rode bikes with, played kick the can with, etc., make a little 4 year old boy who was out playing with the big kids go into a tool shed, take down his pants, and do things with himself. Ugh.

Anonymous wrote:I walked home from my suburban school alone when I was in first grade. When I was in second grade a girl I played with over the summer was kidnapped while riding her bike to a local park and was never found. Today I work in the news business and every day on the state wires there are so many stomach turning stories of sexual predators, there is NO WAY I'd let my kids out on the street alone the way we used to when I was little. Maybe when they are in 5th.

Wow, I'm so sorry to hear about your friend. Every time I hear someone make the argument about stranger abductions being statistically negligible I think about the poor parents of kids who actually were abducted. No, it's not likely, but if I can cut that down to 0 by meeting the school bus, then I sure will (at least, cut it down to 0 in that time frame). I'm sure the parents of the Lyon sisters, the Lisk sisters, Junior Burdynski, Melissa Brannen, and every other child who was abducted and/or killed by a stranger never thought their kid would be "that one." And I also believe there are other ways to foster independence.

What people seem to forget when they say 'well, I used to walk home' is that things were very different then - I walked home too, but many houses on my route had stay-at-home moms there, some of whom would be outside gardening or doing whatever, but keeping an eye on the kids that were around. Now, there aren't as many parents home, and people are also just less likely to be out and looking out for others. It sounds like in the OP's neighborhood they do, and that's great, but not everyone feels comfortable letting other parents assume responsibility for their kids. Just read the threads here about playgrounds and so forth.