Child's first bus ride from kindergarten goes poorly: mother upset

A Regina mother is unhappy with officials following her five-year-old daughter's first bus ride from kindergarten, when the youngster while safe was not dropped off as expected.

"She got onto the bus and she was never dropped off at the location she was supposed to be dropped off," Sarah Leader said, recalling her daughter Mayzie's experience on Friday.

Mayzie was at St. Francis school for kindergarten in the morning and boarded a school bus that was supposed to drop heroff at her daycare where she was expected around 12:20.

When she didn't arrive, Leader was promptly informed by the daycare people.

Leader spent the next 55 minutes trying to figure out where her child could be.

As it turned out, Mayzie was on the bus but did not get off because the location where the driver stopped, some seven blocks away from the daycare, was not familiar. The child stayed on the bus, in tears.

As Leader was trying to figure out what happened, she said information she was given from St. Francis school was not helpful.

"The school didn't even know if she was on the bus," she said, noting there was further confusion when the school thought she was calling about a mix-up with another child. "They told me at one point that she was in the office and I said to them, well if she's in the office then I'm coming to get her. And then they came back on the line and said wait, it's not your daughter in the office. It's actually another child who had been dropped off because she missed her location."

Leader said she also called the bus operator, First Student Canada, and was given conflicting information.

Finally, she took her own car, left work and tracked down the bus and found her child was safe.

However, Leader said the driver was unaware the girl was still on board.

She said she is pressing officials for answers about the episode.

Sean Conroy, an official from the Regina Catholic School Division called it an unfortunate and rare situation adding that they are investigating.

According to Conroy, the bus driver was working from incorrect information.

"How we can improve communications and what we can do to make sure that our records are correct? That we continuously update those and that something like this doesn't slip through the cracks," Conroy said. "It's an unfortunate data entry error but moving forward, we continue upholding the safety of our students on school buses."

Conroy noted the bus company, First Student, is also investigating.

Calls to the company were not immediately returned.

Leader's concerns were shared with Bob Pringle, Saskatchewan's Advocate for Children and Youth.

"It's our job to make sure our children are protected and safe and nurtured and respected and valued," Pringle said. "So when a child gets lost in the system like this what happened last Friday then none of those tests are met."