My eldest just started kindergarten and it is turning my world upside down for all kinds of reasons. Emotionally, I'm happy, scared, excited, and terrified. I know she's ready, but I'm not sure I'm ready. Logistically, it's making my life more difficult as well because dropping her off is kind of sort of a pain in the arse (it just sounds so much classier if I give it a British twist). I have two kids to drop off in the morning and their schools are not close to each other. My youngest goes to a preschool close to our home, but that starts at a later time than her sister's kindergarten that we have to drive to. It wouldn't be such a big deal, but I work for a living (haven't figured out how to get paid for just being me, yet) and it really cuts into my work time. For a brief exhilarating moment, I thought I had found a solution: school buses! Then my husband acted like I was out of my mind for even considering it and in the end I agreed with him.
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You see, we got a letter from the school district saying we could submit a request for transportation services. I thought, that's it! I took the bus to school as a kid and it was fine. Woo hoo!
The thing is that the buses I took to my schools were dedicated to my particular schools, but here the buses drop kids off at different schools. My kindergartner is not even 5 years old, she's very shy, and certainly does not know her way around the city or even her school. I would have to pin her name and the name of her school onto her before getting her on the bus in the morning. That just doesn't make a parent feel all that confident. I'm sure many kids make it to school safely and are fine, but this just isn't the time for my little one.
So I resigned myself to dealing with the challenge of getting my work done by starting earlier, then taking a break to drop her off during my "work" hours and I almost had a moment of regret when it came to the school buses until I read about these students in Florida, little girls as young as 10 years old who were dropped off 17 miles away from where they actually live and abandoned by their school bus driver. What?!
The Broward County Public Schools spokeswoman Tracy Clark released a statement saying,
We are investigating this incident. Transportation Department representatives reached out to the parents/families of the students this evening.We apologise to the students and families impacted by this incident. The safety and security of our students is our highest priority.
Oh man, there have got to be some pissed parents in Florida. That bus driver better watch out!
Anyway, after reading about that, I don't feel so bad about giving up my daughter's opportunity to ride the bus to school.
Image via Thinkstock
