A Howard County school official says bus driver procedures will be re-evaluated after three Ellicott City children were returned to their home after one was injured on the way to school.
Lori Gerohristodoulos said she was "very confused and scared" when her children came back to the house shortly after they were picked up on Sept. 17. Her youngest child, 5-year-old Timothy, was bleeding from the nose and mouth, she said.
The boy, who attends Veterans Elementary School, said he was injured when the bus ran over a dead deer lying in the road, Gerohristodoulos said. When the driver realized the child was injured, he returned the children, she said.
Gerohristodoulos, who also said she has not received an incident report, is calling on school officials to revise procedures for bus drivers.
The school system has no formal policy addressing what to do with sick or injured children on buses, said David C. Drown, director of transportation for the school system. Instead, bus drivers follow guidelines in a handbook given to them by the school system.
The handbook instructs drivers to take a child to school and alert a school official, or return the child home or to the original bus stop "after making sure that the sick child will be left with a responsible adult or parent."
The procedures were crafted in the 1980s, Drown said.
"We came up with these items when there were a lot of stay at home moms," Drown said. "Nowadays, most parents are working. By 10 o'clock, both are working. We might want to take a look at that."
Drown also said that an incident report should have been generated. He said late yesterday that he had not seen one.
