Sleeping Child Left Behind In Locked Bus

A Head Start bus driver has been disciplined after parking and locking her bus for the day as an overlooked child slept inside.

Ty Miera, 4, lay down on a seat last Thursday en route to his baby sitter after school. Nearly two hours later, his teacher found him in the parked, locked school bus - unharmed and just waking up from his extended nap.

The bus driver was “sick” about the oversight, Head Start director Doug Fagerness said Tuesday.

“It shouldn’t have happened,” he said. “But when looking back over that employee’s record, I couldn’t help but take into account the thousands of good decisions this employee has made, including delivering hundreds of children home safely every night during adverse North Idaho driving conditions.”

Head Start officials declined to identify the driver.

Each day, bus drivers carry a list detailing where each child is supposed to be let off. This particular day, the driver accidentally skipped Miera and wasn’t reminded the child was on the bus because he had fallen asleep.

Concerned about the bus’s failing transmission, the driver parked the bus after finishing the route and hurried to call the transportation specialist about the problem. She forgot to check through the bus.

Miera was discovered missing after his mother, Eelia Miera, panicked when she didn’t find him at the baby sitter’s where she was supposed to pick him up.

At first, she thought the bus was simply late. But when her son still hadn’t arrived at 6 p.m., she called a Head Start employee who had been her older son’s bus driver. He called Ty’s teacher, who found the boy in the bus.

“Of course, I was thinking the worst - who could have my son?” Miera said. “It’s something that never should have happened.”

Miera said Tuesday she’s still supportive of the Head Start program and plans to continue her son’s attendance.

“Appropriate disciplinary measures were taken,” Fagerness said. “I don’t believe it will happen again.”

, DataTimes