SAN ANTONIO -- A child jumped out of a moving school bus and now the person who was supposed to be watching him has resigned while the bus driver has been suspended.
The San Antonio Independent School District says there was a bus monitor who was supposed to be watching the boy who leapt out of the bus. The bus monitor was one of several additional layers of security put into place to watch the boy since he had tried to jump out of the bus before.
On Thursday, SAISD said that the safety measures that were supposed to keep a 9-year-old boy safe failed.
Wednesday after school, a bus left Austin Academy just north of downtown. When it made a stop at East Houston and W.W. White, a 9-year-old boy jumped out the back door just as the bus started moving again.
“They dared him to escape again, and jump off again,” one parent said.
Yes. “Again.”
The school district told KENS 5 that the boy had done this before. Once, he tried and never made it off the bus. Another time, he did jump off bus, but it wasn't moving.
After those attempts, the school district assigned a monitor to the bus.
The district said that monitors are usually assigned to buses with special needs children on board. On Wednesday, the bus monitor was near the child, but not able to stop him from jumping.
That monitor has now quit.
“I don't think he should be allowed to be riding the bus if he's done this before,” parent Eloi Herrera said. “What's going to happen if he does it again and he's going 30 miles an hour or something?”
“Most of the children, their parents are working. They're by themselves over here, and the only way to go home is the bus,” another parent said.
The school district says that it will meet with the family in the next few days to decide if the child should continue to ride the bus.
The bus driver is on leave, pending the outcome of the investigation.