Parents Outraged After 4-Year-Old Boy Accidentally Put On School Bus
RANDALLSTOWN, Md. (WJZ) — A Baltimore County mother is outraged after her 4-year-old son disappears from his elementary school.
Meghan McCorkell has more on how this happened.
That 4-year-old boy was put on a school bus after class and dropped off at a stop Monday. Problem is, he doesn't ride the bus.
Kyra Cottie lived every parent's nightmare.
"He's my baby. It's hard," she said.
She went to pick up her 4-year-old son Pierre at Hernwood Elementary School. Inside, his classroom was empty.
"Nobody knew anything. They didn't know where he was," Cottie said.
Turns out, her 4-year-old was put on a school bus and dropped off at the Carriage Hill Apartments-- two miles away.
McCorkell: "Had you ever been on the school bus before?"
Pierre: "No."
A former school employee found him crying, wandering lost by himself. She called the school.
McCorkell: "Was it scary? How did you feel?"
Pierre: "Bad."
Now Cottie wants answers about why her son was ever put on the bus. Baltimore County school officials say within one hour they'd figured out how the mistake was made.
"It is the unthinkable. It's a parent's nightmare. It's a school system's nightmare," said Dr. Renee Foose, Baltimore County Schools.
Foose says she launched an investigation and took immediate action against the personnel involved. But she understands why parents are outraged.
"Parents should be outraged. We're outraged that this happened," she said.
Cottie says her son is so scared he doesn't want to return to school.
"I'm sorry. But 'sorry' isn't going to cut it," Cottie said.
She wants to make sure no parent goes through this same ordeal.
School officials say they do have safeguards in place so this doesn't happen but admit there was a break in the system.
Baltimore County Schools has not released what action was taken against employees involved. They say that is a personnel matter.
