At what age do you think a student would be allowed by the bus driver to get off the bus, cross... - Page 2

[jennlyn]

Our district does not allow kids in K to get off the bus unless someone is waiting at the bus stop to pick them up. Not sure if they are allowed to get off if they are in the company of an older sibling.

[CarrieMF]

I put 4 because the cut off date here is Dec 31 so there are kids who are 4 in kindergarten.

I also think it is appropriate, but then I grew up in rural areas where kids were dropped off at the laneway & once you crossed in front of the bus the bus left to the next farm.

Here town kids are not bussed unless they go to the public catholic system or if they're in Grades 7-12 & then they are picked up at various schools and bussed to their next school. Some(city and out of town kids) have a transfer at the highschool. At the various bus stops(which aren't marked at all) there are no adults waiting or dropping kids off.

All the kids in the schools do bus safety at the beginning of the year.

[Ellien C]

I voted 5 because that's the way it was when I was a kid. I'm not sure it's that way now. My sister is now living with my parents and her 3 kids go to my old elem school. I think my Dad has to meet the youngest at the bus stop and he wanted to know what would happen if he missed it. I had no idea because it wasn't that way when I went to school.

[Sustainer]

Originally Posted by bigeyes

I was flabbergasted that I was in a bad neighborhood and expected to just toss my kid out there to wait alone for a bus while I went in another direction to work in the early AM darkness.

It seems insane to me that anyone would expect a mother to do that with her child!

[Daffodil]

I was recently at a school board meeting where this issue was being discussed. The elementary school principal suggested that kids 7 and under with no sibling on the bus should be let off only if a parent was visible. But one of the board members said he would be really annoyed at having to walk all the way down his long driveway to meet his kid. (This is a rural area where a lot of people have long, long driveways.) And he pointed out that the driver would have no way of knowing whether the adult he saw waiting for the bus was a parent or relative or malicious stranger. In the end, it was agreed that the principal would send a letter to all the parents of kids 7 and under asking them to specify whether their kid should or should not be let off without an adult present.

[elmh23]

I voted 5 because my area doesn't have school buses until K.

[sunnmama]

Originally Posted by elmh23

I voted 5 because my area doesn't have school buses until K.

The same here.

I live in an apt complex, and about 15-20 kids use our bus stop. There is no way the bus driver could be responsible for making sure that the kids have an adult present (there are a bunch of adults and a bunch of kids, but it creates a cluster of people and no way the driver could tell which kid belonged to which child before driving off).

[jocelyndale]

The driver would wait to see that we got in the door at age 5. I don't know if the babysitter waved or not. Later on, if we were dropped off after dark, we had to flick the porch/field light.

[Viola]

I voted 6, because that is first grade around here. My daughter just started riding the bus this year, in 4th grade. She is 9, and she walks about .2 of a mile to the bus stop in the morning, and back in the afternoon. I'm not sure if they would let kindergartners off in a situation like this or not. I don't think my 5 year old could handle it by herself, so I wouldn't let her do it, but I think it's fine for my 9 year old.

We live a little over a mile from the school, and I see fairly young children riding their bikes or walking. My daughter had a friend in her class last year who would walk home from school on her own, but I didn't feel comfortable letting mine do that, although sometimes I would go a little late to pick her up, and let her walk part of the way home.

I used to walk 1 mile to school when I was 7, and then a little less than half a mile to the bus stop when I was 8, but the bus would drop us off in front of our house on the way home, for some reason.

In my sister's school's district, the one I grew up in, the bus drivers wouldn't let elementary kids off without an adult there to meet them at the bus stop. They would take them back to the school and call the parent to pick up the child. I remember my mother rushing home to meet my nephew at his bus stop.

[Sustainer]

Originally Posted by Ellien C

My sister is now living with my parents and her 3 kids go to my old elem school. I think my Dad has to meet the youngest at the bus stop and he wanted to know what would happen if he missed it. I had no idea because it wasn't that way when I went to school.

That's sort of what I'm wondering too. I live in the country and the bus drops my child off at the bottom of our driveway. (Or, rather, across the street from it.) I'm wondering what would happen if for some reason I wasn't standing right there in sight at that moment. Would she be taken back to the school and I'd have to pick her up? Would the driver drop her off but then call me and ask me about it or even report me to someone? Or, as it seems to me would be most likely, would he simply drop her off and think nothing of it? I personally have zero experience with school busses. The other thing I'm wondering is if I should, at some point in the future, try letting my child come up the driveway alone and meet me somewhere out of sight of the bus. If I started making a habit of such a thing, I wonder if the driver would think anything of it, depending on my child's age when and if that time comes. At this point it's hard for me to imagine not wanting to meet my child right at the bottom of the driveway. I might take baby steps. Wait half way up the driveway and then at the top of the driveway and then in the front yard. I don't know how long I'll spend at each stage.

Here's another question: At what age were you (or would you be) comfortable with your child crossing a country road without adult supervision? Assuming that you know that your child is not going to wander off or run away but is simply going to walk to the house. So the only thing you have to worry about is cars and stuff like that. (I mean the child's age, of course.)

[sillygrl]

I rode the bus in kindergarten and then again starting in 6th grade. In Kindergarten, the bus picked us up at the end of our drive (rural area) and our drive was just a short driveway, so they always saw my grandparents.

By the time I was in the 6th grade, I was so used to walking to school every day anyway that it was no big deal for me to walk to the bus stop. I started walking to school on my own in the first grade. Quite a ways away, too. My mom didn't have the car and wasn't inclined to walk with me.

[TCMoulton]

In our district it is at the discretion of the parents. All bus riders have a pass that they either must wear around their neck or have attached to their backpack. Their is a place on the pass that a parent may sign that requires an adult meet the child at the bus stop every day. If no adult is waiting then the child is taken to district headquarters to wait for a parent.

[rabrog]

Um...what's the bus driver supposed to do if there is no one there to receive a young child? I don't know if there's a policy for this or not. I guess I would say if a parent isn't comfortable with their child doing this, they need to pick the child up from school or be home when the bus comes.

Jenn

[supervee]

Originally Posted by rabrog

Um...what's the bus driver supposed to do if there is no one there to receive a young child? I don't know if there's a policy for this or not. I guess I would say if a parent isn't comfortable with their child doing this, they need to pick the child up from school or be home when the bus comes.

Jenn

Apparently here they take the kid back to the school immediately, which delays the rest of the route. But our routes are really short.

[TCMoulton]

Originally Posted by rabrog

Um...what's the bus driver supposed to do if there is no one there to receive a young child? I don't know if there's a policy for this or not. I guess I would say if a parent isn't comfortable with their child doing this, they need to pick the child up from school or be home when the bus comes.

Jenn

Here if a parent has specified that an adult must meet their child and one is not waiting at the stop the child is taken, at the end of the route, to t he district headquarters where he/she waits to be picked up by a parent.

[eepster]

Sorry I voted wrong. I hit 9, but our district will drop off kindergarteners (5yo by Oct 1) without adults to recieve them.

[tinasquirrel]

I'm not sure at what age our bus driver will stop wanting someone to be out there to meet my son. But, he's in 1st grade now, and I know that someone has to be out there still. (Maybe I'll ask on Monday!) One time, last year, my DH didn't realize that he had to be outside and visible to the bus driver for her to let DS off the bus. He was upstairs answering the phone, and had left our garage door open for DS. But, she wouldn't let him off. He had to stay on the bus for the rest of the route, and then she brought him back to school. I figured out what happened about 10 minutes after the bus passed our house, and I drove to school to meet the bus and pick him up. She actually does the same route about 40 minutes later for the junior high/high school, and would have brought him around to try again if I hadn't met the bus at the school.

I'm not sure if we have group bus stops here. Every child seems to be left off at their house. The bus stops at my house, and then stops about 2 houses down for an older child.

[TiredX2]

Our school district only requires a pick-up for Kinders. So, 1st graders get off the bus and don't need a parent/adult. So, 6-7 for most kids, some kids would still be 5.

[Minky]

It was 5 where I lived in Wisconsin. I was a nanny for two special needs kids, an 18 mo and a 5 yo. The bus driver would drop the 5 yo off in front of the apartment complex regardless of whether I was outside waiting for him or not.

When I started the job. the mom had no idea what time he would be dropped off, so I estimated, was wrong, and would find him wandering around the apartment complex. I didn't think it was a good policy, but there wasn't much I could do about it other than figure out when he was going to be dropped off and wait outside with the baby until he arrived.

[LynnS6]

1st grade, I believe is what it is in our district. In K, they make sure there's a parent/caregiver there to pick them up. In 1st grade, we got no such notice.

There is one child who lives right across the street from the bus-stop and her teenage sisters are home to watch her 2-3 days a week. (Mom's there the other days.) often we don't see the sisters, but the bus driver has never said anything, even last year when she was in 1st grade.

there's another 4th grader (who looks about 8) who walks down the block to his house by himself, and his mom arrives about 15-20 minutes later.