Two children were put on the wrong bus home, then dropped at the wrong stop, all while their worried parents tried to find them.
By JANETTE NEUWAHL
Published August 5, 2004
CLEARWATER - Addie Currington thought she had overprepared.
She kept telling her son and daughter to make sure they take bus No. 128. She made sure they knew their bus stop, at Arcturas Avenue and Rainbow Drive. Finally on Tuesday morning, Currington got them onto the school bus and waved to them as they rode away to their first day of classes.
At 3 p.m., her husband, Nathan, walked down from their home to the bus stop to pick up Jacobi, 9, and Alysia, 6.
But they weren't there.
An hour later, the couple's children were still missing. Nathan Currington learned they weren't at Belcher Elementary. They weren't at home either.
About 4 p.m., Jacobi and Alysia walked up to their home, sweaty and scared. They told their mother they had been put on the wrong bus by a school administrator - 329, instead of 128. They also said their bus driver refused to take them to the right stop. Instead, he left them at Hercules Avenue and Drew Street, a busy intersection the youngsters had to cross before walking more than half a mile home.
What infuriates Mrs. Currington most is the danger her children were put into by the bus driver.
"My son told the bus driver it wasn't his stop and the driver said, "Oh well, get off'," she said on Thursday. "He left them there to fend for themselves on a busy street they had to cross by themselves . . .
"I didn't want to go to work today and have the same thing occur because Lord knows where they'll get dropped off today."
So after Mrs. Currington had already taken Monday off work to make sure everything was set before the first day of school, she took off Wednesday to make sure she solved the kids' bus problems.
Pinellas County Schools' routing supervisor Tom Reichert said he could not comment on exactly what happened to Jacobi and Alysia because of student confidentiality. He said the matter has been referred to the Office of Professional Standards, which is collecting information from witnesses.
"One thing you can conclude from all this is that when a student is dropped off at a wrong bus stop, it's not taken lightly and the district will find out what happened," he said.
Currington, 34, can't afford to send the kids to after-school care anymore, so they have to be able to take the bus safely, she said.
What happened Tuesday didn't fit into her vision of safe, even though the school system uses a color-coded, patterned wristband to match students up with their buses. Currington said her children had wristbands with blue and white checkered pattern for bus 128. On Tuesday, she said, a school administrator replaced their bands with a blue one for bus 329.
Belcher Principal Lisa Roth said the confusion about what bus to put the youngsters on happened because the school system listed Jacobi and Alysia on multiple bus routes, causing administrators to put them on bus 329.
"I do know that transport is investigating and working to make sure that they don't have any more oversights like this," said Roth. "But from our end, we'll be sure that we know what bus the students should be on and that they are put on the correct bus."
On Wednesday afternoon, Roth delivered. Currington said she was relieved Jacobi and Alysia were taken to the correct bus stop.
Roth said she is not aware of any other children who had the same problems coming home from Belcher Tuesday. The elementary school welcomes 16 buses each morning and afternoon to transport students and they have a large stock of extra wristbands to rebracelet the kids should they lose their wristband during the school day.
With more than 68,000 district students riding the buses, Reichert said some problems are inevitable. Also, to save money, the school system initiated a system where certain routes may have a different driver in the morning than the afternoon, which could further complicate things for children who associate a familiar face with the bus they ride.
"If parents say that a school put their student on the wrong bus there's always a human element - either a teacher or principal is involved and then there's the student," Reichert said.
Reichert remained apologetic about the mixup, but Currington is still hesitant to trust the school. Even after a personal call from the principal.
"I wanted to believe the school had their best interests at heart, but I don't think so anymore," she said.
