Road rage directed at school bus, rider
A stranger confronts a school bus driver and a boy over an object tossed. Officials say policy wasn't followed.
By REBECCA CATALANELLO
Published November 10, 2004
Everyone agrees a 9-year-old boy tossed something out of bus No. W046 on its journey from Trinity to Deer Park Elementary in New Port Richey. The boy's mother says the object was gum wrapped in paper. The principal has heard it might have been just paper.
Whatever the case, it was enough to enrage a man who, school officials say, was in his car stopped at a light next to the bus. Depending whose account of the Oct. 26 incident one believes, the object either: came through the window and hit the man; or bounced off the windshield; or went into the car but didn't hit him.
But here's the part in the story that makes parents Mary and Jeff Byrkit nervous.
The man, whose name school officials did not get, followed the bus to the school on Trouble Creek Road. He confronted the bus driver at her window. And then, according to some accounts, he stepped onto the bus and demanded to speak to the boy who had thrown the object.
"Who knows who this guy is or what he could have done?" said Mary Byrkit, mother of the student who threw the object. "Honestly, for a parent this is one of the most mortifying incidents."
And here's the part that makes principal John Shafchuk nervous.
If he's to believe what he heard from his staff, he said, a teacher's aide on bus duty allowed the unknown adult access to speak to the child outside the bus. The boy, Shafchuk said, apologized. By the time Shafchuk arrived on the scene, the child was crying and the stranger was gone.
"We don't like any instance where a child is put in that situation," Shafchuk said. "I'm disappointed that he even got to talk to the boy."
Mary Byrkit told a St. Petersburg Times reporter that she hadn't heard about the one-on-one conversation between the stranger and her son. She said her son says he remained at the back of the bus, tearful and terrified about the man's demands.
To Ruth Reilly, the Pasco County administrator who oversees elementary schools, all of the available accounts of that Oct. 26 morning are cause for concern.
The boy should not have thrown the object, she said. The stranger should not have had access to either the bus or the student - that's clearly against district policy, she said. And school officials should have acted promptly by calling on the principal and law enforcement officials to intervene.
"We are talking with individuals to make sure that this doesn't happen again," Reilly said. "Clearly, people stepped over the boundary of what's safe and appropriate."
Byrkit said her son got a warning from the school for his behavior.
Reilly said the district was investigating the incident, and would be taking "appropriate action" against involved staff members, should it be warranted.
Jeff Byrkit said that, more than anything, the incident made him reflect on the vulnerability of his son's school. Deer Park is one of 15 in the county without a school resource officer on campus, said Pasco sheriff's Lt. Brian Moyer, the school district's safety officer.
"Anything can happen," Jeff Byrkit said. This was one situation in which having a school resource officer on campus might have helped quell the situation, he said.
Moyer agreed that he would like to have the funds to staff all 59 Pasco County schools with on-duty safety officers. But he cautioned that even resource officers do not guarantee immunity under such conditions. Moyer, Shafchuk and Reilly said the school should have had a better response.
As for children tossing things from buses, district transportation director Mike Park said it's not uncommon. Park on Tuesday attended the expulsion hearing of a middle schooler who threw a bottle from a bus window.
"It does make motorists upset when something happens," Park said. "It does make them act irrationally. But we try to keep them away from the students."
Times researcher Carolyn Edds contributed to this report. Rebecca Catalanello covers education in Pasco County. She can be reached in west Pasco at 869-6241 or toll-free at 1-800-333-7505, ext. 6241. Her e-mail address is rcatalanello@sptimes.com