My DC missing for 4 hours after school.!!

[Highfivemum]

had no intention of putting this up for discussion but after call today I am livid and would like some opinions
so my DC summer born started high school beginning of the month. Just 11 so young in year. He catches the coach from our village and has done this since he started. All fine up until yesterday when he was not on the coach when I waited for it after school. Tried his phone and it was turned off. Frantic drive to school with other DC and he was no where to be found. School did not have a clue where he was. Caretaker and head teacher called back into school ( they had both left premises when I got there) they both insisted he got the coach etc as all year 7 were taken to the coach stop at rear of school and escorted on the coach. For info it is a small high school. And only runs 3 coaches to surrounding villages.
Cutting a long story short that seemed like days for me my DC was discovered to be on another coach and was in another village, sitting by the coach stop. We eventually were reunited over 4 hours later.
my DC was distraught. He said his teacher let them out of lessons late and took three Dc to the back of the school and put them all on the same coach. This was the only coach left at school as the others had left. He said no time to collect their phones from the office. This was the wrong coach. When the coach arrived at its final destination my DC who was to upset to say anything got of the coach ,And there he sat till the error was discovered and we collected him.
the school today have said my son was at fault and he should have spoke to the driver and not got off the coach.,,, yes I get that but they have not admitted any mistake with the staff at all.
I am livid. Am I being unreasonable. What would anyone else think/ do. My DH took our DC to school today as they didn’t want to go.

Before he went to bed he said I knew you or Dad would find me mum but it seemed to take forever.

Jeez, that has made me tearful, too! What a wee soul, God love him.

(Thank you for your lovely reply to me, btw. I try to be a good person who’d always help others.)

As parents you try and prepare them for different scenarios that may happen when they go up to big school, you can't prepare for every eventuality though!

I certainly wouldn't expect a teacher to keep children behind who take the school bus so early into the term

And I've never had a situation where they didn't have their phones . Now it's happened op can work with him so he is more confident if it ever happened again but I don't think this is something that most of us as parents would have thought our child would be dealing with

He's still a little boy, my 3rd is 11 and has gone up this year and while he's nearly as tall as me it's been a bit of a shock to him how awful some children are. And we live in a shitty area and he was at primary in a school in a shitty area . It's not prepared him when thrown into a big pond like secondary school

I would be furious!
your child got plonked on the wrong coach and left! The teacher should have confirmed it was the right coach knowing the children were late to board!! I’ve been a teacher and this is gross misconduct he is 11 years old.

Im sorry to say this but what if something would have happened to your son? Hit by a car, taken by a stranger…. IT HAPPENS BELIEVE ME!! this cannot happen again, I would take this all the way because one day it could happen again and that parent not be as quick to respond!

I hope your child is ok and knows this is not their fault.

I’m in genuine disbelief at this thread. I’m only a millennial but holy shit things have changed since I was at school.

a) teacher shouldn’t have let them out late so they missed bus. 100% with you on that OP
b) child should know not to get on the wrong bus - two children with him clearly not from same area. He should have told the driver.
c) why get off when not the right area?
d) FOUR HOURS?! Nobody here wonders what occurred in that time - given OP was told he got on a coach? Only three coaches and it’s a small school? Why were the police not called?
e) “anything could have happened” what exactly? The kid is 11 not 5.

I feel for you OP and understand why you are angry. I feel for your DS. But i would expect this kind of outrage for 5,6,7 year old. Not 11 and at a small high school.

Did no-one see him sitting at a bus stop for 4 hours?

I vividly remember the school coach going the wrong way (I was the last stop so everyone else was off the bus). I told the bus driver, complained, asked for his name to report him and finally was let off in a random place, several miles from home.

Unfortunately adults don’t always behave well to children and teens. I think since I was at school the authoritarianism and expectation of not questioning adults has increased. I’m not at all surprised that an eleven year old child, on their own, having been told by the teacher to get on the coach didn’t feel able to say anything to the driver.

Op, yes I am sure you were, not surprisingly, completely petrified & I am relieved that your son is fine. When reading this I thought your son was behaving more like a yr 3/4 child than a yr 7 & I say this as a teacher. I also believe that the teacher should not have forced any child to stay behind late. Did your son not realise that he had a bus to catch & needed to tell the teacher? Were the whole class made to stay behind? Is it only the 3 of them that catch a bus? Did your son not realise that he doesn’t normally catch the same bus as the other 2 children? I think there are many questions that need to be answered before instantly blaming the teacher. Does your son have special needs? Hopefully though you will now teach your secondary school son & your younger children some other useful life skills.Yes, it was sensible that he stayed still. But; Does he know your telephone number? Is it not written at the front of his diary? Why was he unable to speak to the bus driver & say this isn’t my stop? Or to ask for help? Hopefully this incident will ensure he knows how to handle himself better in future.

@Queuesarasarahbut respectfully that’s not what happened here - in fact if it had the bus driver would almost certainly be sacked? Unlike days of old where adults could get away with treating children badly. Now we have the “livid” and “fuming” brigade.

For the same reason I also strongly disagree that children are now more afraid to question teachers.

And I should add before anyone jumps on, of course it is right things have changed and adults should respect and nurture children. But this seems like a mix up.

I think some pp are really expecting a lot/too much from an 11 year old child in a fairly new environment. Just because some children are street smart doesn't mean all are at this young age.

In my school (not UK based) children aged up to 12 or13 aren't allowed outside the school gates unless collected by an adult. They still manage to grow up to be responsible and competent adults, and have no difficulty speaking up for themselves or navigating buses (or life) later on. They are just allowed be children for a little longer it seems.

@Lucyintheskywithrubies but when is the line drawn between nurturing and infantilising? There seems to be a strange idea that an 11 year old is a ‘poor wee boy’. But children days after their 3rd birthday are expected to be in full time education. And then there is the 16 year old who needs to be ‘scooped up’ and a taxi ordered and payed for them by the college. Part of nurturing is teaching skills for life.

Sorry that should be 4th birthday

@Blackheath95if you read back to my original post you will see that I agree with you. I was just responding to someone else above.

@Foxesformeisn't it the case that at U.K. primary schools in years 5&6 children are able to travel to school on their own - I.e. age 9/10/11? It certainly was at my DCs school.

I agree with everything you've said. People's reactions on here are batshit. He's in high school, not Reception class. I can't quite get over that he sat at a bus stop for over three hours without attempting to raise the alarm, as it were.

@Lucyintheskywithrubies
I don't know, I'm not based in the UK. To be fair our school is rural so most children need to be driven there anyway, and that's probably why there are strict rules in place about letting children out. There are no footpaths, no public transport in our particular area. Lots of places in the UK are similar though I'd imagine. Not everyone lives in towns and for many children secondary school is the first time they have to navigate a fairly busy urban environment on their own. It takes a bit of getting used to.

He needs to be taught life skills. 11 years old is not a little boy.
Children need to be taught to speak up and say to other adults when they need help. The bus driver would have sorted something out if he had spoken up.

The school is at fault and you should go through their complaints procedure. I can understand your son not daring to argue with the teacher when he was put on the wrong bus, but I'm a bit surprised that he didn't say anything to the driver instead of just getting off in the wrong place. The driver could have called the bus company and raised the alarm. Hopefully you will now discuss with your son what to do in various situations e.g. keep phone in bag, if phone dead then find an adult and ask to ring home, etc.

I attended a rural secondary with lots of bus routes. If we missed the bus we were stuck. The school building was long and thin with the buses at one end. If your last lesson of the day was at the far end of the school to the buses you had to run like hell!

There were six coaches for our rural secondary school - we had to queue up in the main hall at 4pm and after (and only after) our names were called from the transport register, we were escorted to the coach by a teacher … and that was between 1966 and 1971. What’s changed?!!!

This won't fix the situation but...
This might have been raised already and wouldn't have necessarily have helped but maybe get DC to memorise your mobile number so they could call from a strangers/public phone. I was recently in hospital and they lost my phone briefly and I didn't know what to do without relatives numbers despite being in my 30s.

Was that in the UK?
Because very different from my experience.

Genuine question, is it a normal thing in UK secondary schools for kids to hand in phones at the start of the day & be put on
busses by teachers or is this school a very small school?. There's 1200 students at my kids school I just can't see how that would even work. Here the bell goes & the kids figure it out themselves. I can't imagine my kids or any of their friends getting on the wrong bus & then just getting off and not saying anything. Still glad all ended well.

It was in the UK 🇬🇧

I totally agree with @WinterDeWinter.

@Ncfreely
Yes indeed, anything could have happened. Lots of things happen to adults, never mind children. A lone child at a bus stop in a place they don't know is vulnerable just as I would be if I were stuck for 4 hours at the back end of a day at a bus stop in a place I don't know. A child is hardly likely to ask a stranger to use their phone to phone home as someone suggested.
11 year olds are just as different from each other as adults are. Some of us stand up for ourselves and some are shy and don't confront others (which is abundantly evident on MN)
In a new school with a pushy male teacher and no friends with him, no wonder the boy was confused.

At the school my eldest son attended, the school's legal responsibility for the child's welfare started when they arrived at the school and ended when the child ARRIVED HOME after the school day ended.