Wendy Rants

I have to comment on one of the biggest frustration in having a special needs child-the lack of training given to the bus drivers and monitors. The district transportation departments contract these jobs out or put in their own people with the same training they recieved for dealing with typical children. Then, lo and behold, you end up with situations like this---


Yonkers school officials: autistic boy left on bus without required safety alarm
By Ernie GarciaThe Journal News • October 19, 2008
http://www.lohud.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081019/NEWS02/810190374

YONKERS - A school bus on which a 6-year-old autistic boy was left for six hours did not have an alarm system mandated by the school district.
The alarm's purpose is to ensure that a driver does not miss any sleeping or hiding children.

On Friday, Yonkers schools spokeswoman Jerilynne Fierstein confirmed that the minibus owned by Allways East Transportation did not have the required Child Check Automatic Alarm.
"The company involved with this incident has a few vans that do not have the alarms, and on this particular day one of these vans was used," Fierstein wrote in a statement. "The District emphatically directed the bus company to cease using non-compliant vans or buses on any Yonkers routes."
School officials acknowledged the missing alarm after a Journal News reader sent the newspaper a copy of the district's 2007 request proposal for bus services for the 2007-10 school years.
The document clearly states that all vehicles must have the alarms.
The device is installed in the interior of the bus in the rear, and a bus driver must deactivate it by walking to the back of the bus.
Sofy Abraham's 6-year-old son was left on the bus Sept. 29 at Westchester Hills School 29 and reportedly was found on the bus later that day.
"How could they miss him if he sits right behind the bus driver?" Abraham said Friday. "The police told me that the monitor and the bus driver say that they did drop him off."
Abraham said her son is in good condition, but that he has little speaking ability, so it is unknown what happened to him during the time he was missing.
Fierstein noted that the driver has been banned from driving any school bus carrying Yonkers public school children and that the district has filed administrative charges against the bus monitor - a district employee - with her union.
Fierstein said the district immediately contacted police and that it continues to collaborate with police on the matter.
Yonkers police spokeswoman Lt. Diane Hessler said her department has made no arrests but that the matter was still under investigation.
Allways East Transportation, based in Yonkers, said previously that police have asked the company not to comment.
Abraham said the Westchester County District Attorney's Office also has become involved in the case. But on Friday, the official in charge of such issues was not at work, so the office's spokesman, Lucian Chalfen, could not confirm his department's involvement.
The Abraham boy is not the only autistic child in the region who disappeared recently for an entire school day.
On Thursday, New York City police arrested a school bus driver and a bus monitor after a 3-year-old autistic child was left on a school bus for six hours in the Bronx.
As with the Abraham boy, the Bronx boy's mother did not learn that her child had never arrived at school until the end of the school day.
The company involved in the Bronx incident was Pinnacle Bus Service of Brooklyn.
Abraham said Yonkers school officials should reconsider how they notify parents when their children do not show up for class.
"The system stinks that they don't call you until 6:30 p.m. to tell you your child was absent," she said.
Reach Ernie Garcia at elgarcia@lohud.com or 914-696-8290.


We are lucky that we have a really nice driver and monitor this year. Although we have actually gotten along with the driver and monitor this year, the transportation dispatch does not like me. They recognize my voice from problems in the past. The school districts always seem flabbergasted when you have trust issues with them---HELLO!! Wake up and smell the incompentence, people!