ST. LOUIS – Every school day, Senia Terry walks to the intersection of Taylor and Forest Park to meet her daughter at the bus stop.
On Tuesday, she was running a few minutes late and found her daughter waiting for her.
The bus driver had left.
“It wasn't approved by me,” Terry said. “I never received a call, nothing.”
Terry’s 7-year-old daughter was left with a stranger, another mom from the bus stop.
“She could have been let off the bus with a crack head, with a serial killer. She could have been let off the bus with anyone,” Terry said.
Turns out, the bus driver did nothing wrong.
A spokesperson for St. Louis Public Schools sent a statement to 5 On Your Side saying, “per district policy, bus drivers dropping off students after school are not obligated to wait for parent/ guardian pickup if students are in grades 1-12.”
There are exceptions if students have special needs, and for younger students who are in kindergarten and preschool.
Terry said, while she takes responsibility for being late, the policy needs to change.
“If they would have taken her back to the school, I would rather any of that rather than be let off the bus with an unknown person,” Terry said. “Something needs to be done.”
