School bus issue - I'm terrifed for my son - what can I do?

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Hi, everyone.

We had such a bad incident today (or I thought it was bad). I keep thinking of the young man who died recently after being left on a school bus all day and although this may be paranoia, after today I'm REALLY scared.

My son is moderately autistic and intellectually delayed. He is 12 years old and very trusting. Today he wasn't home at his regular time. After the bus was 15 minutes late I called the school, but the office had closed. So I called the bus company and was told, "Yes, the bus pickup was late today. He should be home in 15 minutes."

Fifteen minutes of staring through my window for the bus later, my phone rang. It was the grandmom of the other boy on the bus (the bus carries only these two, my son and her grandson). Her son was already home. We live less than five minutes from the school, we are literally on the same street as the school and the only reason I have my son take the bus is because his and his brother's pickup and drop-off times conflict on certain days so I'd be 20 minutes late regularly to pick one or the other of them up. But I mean...we are literally five traffic lights from the school. This other boy lives half an hour away! He was already home so where was my son???

I panicked and called the bus company. I asked what on earth happened and WHERE WAS MY SON. She stated the bus driver "went out of her way" (um, thank you?) to cover for the regular bus driver who wasn't in (good coverage there, bus company) so she "made the decision" not to have to go "all the way back to our house" first, instead she drove all the way out, across the freeway during rush hour traffic (in Los Angeles County!) and THEN would be doubling back to drop my son off.

I said, "What do you mean, 'all the way' back? We are DOWN THE STREET from you." She got p*ssy and said this was the bus driver's decision and she felt it was the right thing. I said, "I have to inform you that this was NOT the right thing." I said, "My son has already been on that bus for close to an hour! Do you know what that is for an autistic child?" She said, "Well, this was my decision."

I said I wanted to speak to a manager. The "manager" (who knows if it really was a manager) was huffy immediately and flatly told me this was their decision, period. I said, "That is NOT ACCEPTABLE." I reiterated that we are DOWN THE STREET from them, they took my son WITHOUT PERMISSION 30 MINUTES AWAY (and back) and NEVER EVEN TOLD ME. She told me that it was what it was, basically. I told her that wasn't acceptable! I wasn't getting through to her!

So she told me, "It should only be about fifteen more minutes." I said, "You told me that half an hour ago."

The bus finally gets to my house...as I'm getting my son at the door the phone rings...it's the bus company..."The bus is in front of your house. Are we excused by you to drop off your son without you there?" I said, "I AM here. At the door." She said, "Well, we need your permission for a no-adult-presence dropoff." I said, "You don't need one because currently he is TWO FEET AWAY FROM ME and rapidly closing that gap to give me a hug."

I called the transportation supervisor (she deals with several different schools) - she wasn't in...left a message. Then I emailed their home office - First Student Transportation. I plan to follow up there with a phone call tomorrow. I am shaking as I write this.

This is following a whole year plus this school year so far of idiocy from this bus company (including how they "forgot" to pick up ANY of their hundreds of students in our district on their first day...no, I am not kidding) - and last Friday, when they simply never showed up to pick up the kids after school so the school called me to go pick my son up.

I am terrified that they will not deliver him one of these days and I won't know it because the school doesn't call in for absences right away.

What else can I do?

I am crying as I write this. I have put forth so many complaints about this company and so have ALL the other parents (and you should see their Yelp reviews, abysmal, and horror stories like mine). NOTHING is ever done and the school whines that they're under contract with First Student and can't do anything about it.

Please, if anyone can help me, I could really use it right now.

Update: On the suggestion of several people I told this issue to, I have written to the Los Angeles Times, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune and my city's local newspaper asking whether they would be willing to pick this issue up as an article.

I don't think I would let my child on that bus, unless I literally had no other option. Yikes!

Can you call an IEP meeting and make them make other arrangements, somehow, I wonder.

Edited for syntax

Isn't there an option for private transport?

IEPs sometimes cover for taxis instead of busses.
This won't help the other parents, but it can help your son while you (and the other parents) take the issue up with the bus company and the school.

I definately agree that this is completely unacceptable; if i were anywhere in a news agency, i'd pressure the redaction to pick up your story (where i live, we even have organizations and TV shows dedicated solely to exposing and solving this kind of issues)

It sounds - to me - like the sub driver had got your son's address wrong, and went the wrong route, with the company only realizing it when you called to ask where your son was ? I will bet that their defensiveness was because they were covering up for their driver not knowing where the child should actually be dropped off.

And, legally, they should send a substitute bus driver if their "regular driver" wad on leave. The sub gets paid the same rate as the regular, so what do they mean, she is doing you a "favour" ??? She was doing her job, not favours, and doing it badly, I might add.

Thanks so much, everyone.

I am going to follow up by calling the transportation manager this morning. I have a message in to her but she hasn't called yet (however, it's still early here - almost 9am).

If they refuse me alternate transportation (or simply can't supply it) I will have to start driving my kids, which means that on a regular basis, one of them will be missing about 15-20 minutes of school. Automatically, one will miss this once a week (Wednesdays) as every Wednesday at my older son's (the subject of this post) school is a minimum day, which conflicts with the end of my other son's regular school day.

The two schools are about 20 minutes apart and operate on two totally different schedules not only for the regular bell schedule but also for when they have minimum days, compact days or days off. For example, last week, my older son had a minimum day for homecoming at the high school next door (I guess because of anticipated parking issues?) while my middle son had a normal day; whereas the week before, one son had a minimum day on Monday but not the other, and three days before that - Friday - it was the other child who had a minimum day while the first child had a full day.

They are in two different school districts due to ASRD being in the school district adjacent to our home district.

This is the only reason I have buses for them in the first place - so that they will both be able to get home, with me here, rather than having to go week by week having one or the other miss a little bit of school.

This is a mess.

And yes, HisMom. I too wondered how getting my son home safely and at a reasonable time (which didn't happen anyway, at least the latter - he IS safe) was a favor, rather than what they are contractually obligated to do. (???)

I can't imagine they are allowed to decide not to take children home from school who are entitled to the bus. One bus driver may have agreed to take extra kids on her route. but if she hadn't, the company would have had to figure something of, I am sure. Maybe she did the company a favor ---but that is not your problem.

I know this is also a pain, but could you call a meeting and make them give extended hours to your kid b/c of the bus issue so your child would not have to miss time? I know that might be an issue too, if he wants to get home, but as it is, you have no idea how long the bus could be. So maybe he would be willing to stay extra so you could coordinate better with your other child's school?

I'm sorry you and your son were put through this. It sounds very stressful and like the bus company was too defensive.

Thanks. I was pretty emotionally wrecked by the end of the day yesterday. Actually went to bed before my kids did. Got a form letter response to my e-mail but it did say that they agreed the situation should not have happened, they just kind of said it in a very generic way - i.e. not mentioning anything specific to my actual situation. The email ended with a "we'll get back to you" sort of thing.

The transportation manager is trying to put us with another bus company.

Sigh...really tired out from all this, it was seriously stressful.