WASHINGTON -- DC Public Schools (DCPS) is launching a grievance investigation into how the school district handled a situation involving a child with autism who was stuck on a school bus for hours on Friday.
WUSA9 had been pushing for answers on this story since Saturday.
On Tuesday, the city office in charge of DC school buses responded saying that the major delay was due to traffic.
A traffic backup is the reason the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) gave to explain why an 8-year-old with autism sat on a school bus for 4 hours Friday.
“Pissed is an understatement for this,” Teresa Holloway told WUSA9 on Monday.
Holloway reached out to WUSA9 on Saturday after, she claimed, the city gave her the runaround about where her grandson, Kevin Ekoh, was.
Holloway said Langley Elementary school could not tell her anything, and OSSE said it kept the family updated.
However, according to Holloway, the staff at OSSE they kept switching up their story.
“Ms. Holloway, it was an incident on Kevin's bus,” Holloway recalled a staff member saying. “I'm sorry. Kevin's bus is on 50…I don't know why I told you all of those things. Kevin is still at school.”
DC police filed an incident report stating Kevin was put on the wrong bus.
WUSA9 sent emails and made phone calls to push the city for answers about what happened to Kevin.
A DCPS spokesperson responded two days later on Monday which was Veterans Day.
The school district said Kevin was put on the correct bus and staff at Langley helped the family sort things out.
OSSE oversees school buses – not DCPS.
A spokesperson for DCPS first told WUSA9 that OSSE combined bus routes Friday which would have meant more kids on one bus with a lot more stops.
However, on Tuesday, the state superintendent’s office contradicted the school district’s statement by saying the bus lines were never merged.
OSSE said the major delay was all because of traffic.
“Had they communicated that with us, I would have picked Kevin up,” Holloway said.
An OSSE spokesperson sent the following statement:
“The delays that resulted in the child arriving home later than scheduled were a result of heavy traffic along the route the bus traveled on Nov. 9, according to OSSE DOT’s bus tracking system, and were not as a result of combined routes as reported. OSSE was in communication with the family during this time to provide updates as to the child’s whereabouts and status. OSSE has followed up directly with the family to address their concerns.”
Holloway has since snatched Kevin out of school, suspended his bus rides, and said she is still waiting on an apology
“No one should ever have to experience something like that,” she said.
The school district is looking into how it handled the situation, and both agencies involved are working with the family on a resolution.
