September 6, 2017 at 4:00 p.m.
Busing mixup on first day of school causes distress
Drivers caught mistakes before students dropped off
Busing mixup on first day of school causes distress
While the incident caused some momentary distress for the children and parents involved, the drivers from Bowen's Bus Service quickly realized mistakes had been made and ensured no children were left alone.
When contacted Tuesday morning, School District of Rhinelander superintendent Kelli Jacobi had not yet been informed of the busing issues.
Crescent principal Gayle Daniel also said she received no calls from parents after dismissal Friday.
"Things went very well at the middle school, which is the transfer site," Jacobi said. "That's where I was."
"We received no calls today nor on Friday," Daniel said Monday. "We did get a call from Bowen's this morning that there was five students that were on the wrong bus number listed after their names. The students did get onto those buses, but Bowen's made it right, of course, and got the kids where they needed to be."
In an interview, Kim Weyers, Bowen's general manager, repeatedly stressed that no child was ever in danger of being left alone. She emphasized that the students were put on the wrong buses at the school, but the drivers quickly realized the children were in the wrong place and steps were taken to help them.
"Everybody got where they needed to go. We even did some switching to make sure that kids got to a day care if that's where they were headed," Weyers said. "I know we had one student where the bus driver, once she was done with her route, she took a road that wasn't even on her route to make sure they got to Grandma's house instead of home."
She noted that while the parents and children involved were understandably upset, there are normally bugs in the route lists and assignments that have to be worked out the first couple days of a new school year.
"That is kind of a typical first day," Weyers said. "Those are issues we have to handle. We make sure the kids get to where they need to go."
When children end up on the wrong bus, the drivers will immediately call the Bowen's office to question if they should be on that bus, she added.
"We work together as a team between the base and the drivers to make sure we know where the kids are going and get them there," she said.
She added the number one concern for everyone at Bowen's is child safety.
Before the first day of school, parents whose children will be riding buses fill out forms and send them to the bus service, which then assigns the child to a bus route and sends that information back to the parents in the form of a postcard. If there is an error, the parents can correct it before the first day of school. The lists are supposed to ensure each child is put on the correct bus at the end of the school day.
"Sometimes it can be confusing, especially when kids have multiple spots that they can be dropped at," Weyers said. "So the first day, everyone is kind of getting familiar with that."
Weyers said the company has touched base with all the schools to make sure that both they and the teachers have the correct information going forward.
"It's usually a process through the first couple of days," she said. "Today we might have a child put on a home bus (instead of their alternate destination) or get picked up. That's just something that we shake out, but we always make sure that the kids that are left with us get where they need to go."
She said each bus has a check-off sheet that the drivers use to make sure they have the correct students.
"That is just another of those fail-safes where if we have a school calling to say this child that is supposed to be a parent pickup is now supposed to be on the bus, we can call the bus driver and say did you mark this student off at the school? If he's on the bus, we have to arrange with the parents to meet the bus somewhere because he was not supposed to ride the bus today," she said. "That is one of those safety things that we've put into place that the bus drivers do all year long."
Jacobi said she was working with Bowen's and the staff at Crescent to make sure there are no repeat problems.
"If we had gotten the bus route lists sooner, it would have helped a great deal," she said. "I will also be working with the individual schools. It sounds like Crescent will be number one. This is the first year that principal has been in our school district at the start of the school year."
Jamie Taylor may be reached via email at [email protected].
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