Submitted by jordy_pordy10 t3_z7svsf in RhodeIsland
I grew up in Massachusetts and it’s not a thing there. Did Rhode Island have a track record of just driving over kids that needed to be remedied?
EDIT: Thank you guys! I knew it was a safety precaution but I wasn’t sure what the catalyst for it was. It’s annoying to be behind, but as a pre school teacher working in Head Start, anything to keep the kids safe is always appreciated.
This literally happened in Acushnet, MA (not far from RI) in the 90s. It was an absolute tragedy. It was the entire reason bus monitors became a standard in the SouthCoast of MA.
Edit: only article I could find that talks about it https://www.southcoasttoday.com/story/news/local/advocate/2015/11/05/petition-seeks-return-bus-monitors/33162602007/
> “We lost a daughter on May 4, 1994, right out front here,” Mrs. Gwozdz said. Her daughter’s jacket tie got caught in the door “and they ran right over her," Mrs. Gwozdz said. She added, "Stacey wasn’t small. She was 13 years old," and thus it would have been easy for someone to see her, had there been a bus monitor.
jesus christ that poor girl and her poor family who had to watch that happen
In more recent years, a kid got his backpack, caught in the closing doors and dragged with the bus for a quarter-mile. It’s just a safe thing to do to ensure all children make it home.
Few years ago (probably a few more now... what even is time) there was a girl i think from Pilgrim HS that got ran over by a school bus.
That was 13 years ago, it was a horrible day :( (she was in my grade)
They didn't check when I was in high school in the early 2000s, but it started some time soon after. We also never had monitors.
Couple years ago in MA one of my husbands relatives was killed because she was dragged by her bus right in front of her father. Sadly, tragedies do happen.
A while back, a girl was run over by a bus wearing a hood and listening to music with earbuds, so she couldn't see or hear the school bus. Since then, the bus monitors check around and under the busses before they leave, and the busses have announcements when they pull away
They’ve been checking under the busses before that incident. It’s a safety precaution to make sure there aren’t any children under the bus.
My uncle was the resource officer working at the school the time of the incident you mentioned. It was a really bad time for him - he had to stand with her body while waiting for someone to show up with something to cover her up AND had to go tell her mother she was killed. It was also the beginning of the school day, so his job was to stand with her body and try to prevent the other students from seeing her… she was decapitated.
If you're talking about the girl in warwick she was crossing the street not paying attention. The bus monitor would have been useless in that situation.
She was in my grade when that happened, it was a horrible day and most honestly I wish they cancelled classes that day.
The worst part about it was the didn’t release the name until the end of the day (it was a Friday) and since she wasn’t a popular student, most kids didn’t really care too much which was sad. Kim was a nice person
I remember that day, it was horrible.
I attended that school when this happened. Terribly sad day
Oh wow that’s awful. Understandable why they do that then.
Wasn’t that a young girl killed by a RIPTA near Pilgrim HS? I didn’t think it was a school bus. Or am I thinking of a different incident?
Kim Pisaturo
Tragic day and never forgotten
The incident you're thinking of involved a big yellow school bus, not a ripta one
Yeah, I was confusing the Pilgrim student hit by the bus and the little girl hit by the RIPTA in Providence a few years later.
I didn't even know about the providence incident. I live in warwick so I knew about the school bus thing
School Bus Trainer here: RI is the only state with a monitor mandate for grades k-5. They are there not only to check under the bus at each stop, but to help us manage the students onboard so we can focus on the important task of driving a 40ft, 16 ton box on wheels that no one pays attention to.
Granted we’re trained to work without one and vey often do; but I’m thankful to have one when I do.
Thank you for all the work you do, truly and genuinely. Without school buses so many kids wouldn’t be able to get to school.
Thank you so much! It may not be the most glamorous job in the world, or the highest paying; but those of us who are in it for the right reasons really enjoy what we do and we do it for the children. I never thought this would be my career but I absolutely love this job and my students are what keep me going.
It’s nice that others appreciate what we do. Sometimes it doesn’t feel that way.
I’m a pre school teacher and while not as extreme, I totally get the not feeling appreciated bit. We defs work with kids for the betterment of them, not for the betterment of ourselves. They deserve the world.
That’s been a thing for a long time. I do t have an explanation but I started elementary school in the early 90s and they were doing that then
I started elementary school in RI in 1985 and it was a thing then. Like people said above, there were a handful of very gruesome, very sad cases that were enough to justify it.
Began elementary school in 1982, and there were definitely bus monitors then, too.
I don't understand why they don't give the monitors a mirror on a stick like border patrol. I have to imagine all that bending and standing is not comfortable for the (often older) monitors leading to a half-hearted effort. I know if I had to get my head down that low and stand, and repeat 3-4 times per stop I'd get dizzy.
If you watch them when they check you can see it is a half assed effort most times
Right because who can repeatedly bend their head down to pavement level without passing out?
I mean, most people. But I'm not against giving them a stick with a mirror on it either.
It’s a safety precaution. Little kids think they are invincible and if they are playing on the yard they will chase after a ball that goes in the street
The example I was always given was a 5ish year old playing and the ball rolls under the bus. Kid goes to get it and is run over. The monitor is checking to see if there is anything under the bus, they are not doing a in depth examination
I once tripped after getting off a bus and ended up underneath it.
Oh jeez that’s scary!
Eh I was a kid. Kids heal fast.
I've never understood why I have never seen low floor school busses, or at least having some body panels that extend down to cover the huge gaps typical yellow school busses have. Seems like it wouldn't be as much of a risk then.
Also I think looking for feet. And I’ve seen the busses waiting to see kids get to the other side of the street.
Thanks for the explanations for folks in this thread about the reasons for school bus monitors. Those make sense. As I don't commute anymore I no longer have a dog in this fight but I will summon my angry younger self to say...
I hate 'em! The monitors are old, slow and take forever to look under the bus. They barely can/will bend over. I swear, even if there was a kid under the bus would they even see them half the time? And where are these kids coming from? Are they feral children, running out of the shrubs to hug the undercarriage of the bus in the hopes of going to school? Every bus stop has cars lined up in each direction and parents waiting to see the kids off. I'm pretty sure there are enough eyes watching for children who might find their way under the bus.
I am a bus monitor and I’m pretty young 26 but most of the buses that have bus monitors are special needs kids, and elementary school. Yes most parents bring their kids but a lot let their little five and six year olds, walk alone across the street alone and there’s just a lot going on, a lot of cars don’t even stop at the stop sign like I’ve seen them keep going in or circuit. It’s more about the cars around that don’t care to stop. For the most part, my driver puts their stuff signed down and let the cars go around if the kid is taking too long
I know when I was in elementary school (90’s), bus monitors tended to be at least 95 years old and universally hated kids. Like, all through school, it was wild.
My kid’s bus driver and monitor know the names of all the kids, have them wait for the all clear to cross, and are really efficient with the under bus check. They also chat with my too-young-for-school kid while the school aged kids get on the bus. I adore them and hope that energy is the norm and not the exception.
I have wondered this also.
I haven’t lived in RI since 2000. I forgot all about this. Has is saved any kids or is it just a waste of time?
I can’t imagine why they can’t install a camera and monitor on each bus, they seem to be about 24” tall, maybe splurge for 2 cameras.
All they need to do is install a camera under the bus and the driver can monitor the situation from their seat.
it's a way that that slow lazy bastards can collect an easy paycheck at the cost of every other driver in the state. 49 other states have been doing just fine for decades without one.
When I was 10, Joey and I were on the bus alone with "grannie" the bus driver. Joey got off the bus at his stop, which was 2nd to last and he dropped his lunch box under the wheel of the bus. When Joey went to grab it, grannie floored it. I remeber the feeling like the bus going over a speed bump. I was in the back. Luckily, he only broke his leg and got a huge settlement out of it. I think this was the turning point in Barrington RI for bus monitors.
Jesus Christ
When I was a kid, another kid got sucked under the bus and killed at a bus stop.
Did you just fall off the cabbage truck?
In the early 90's there was a child that was screwing around on the backside of a bus after getting dropped off and they ended up dying. I think the bus ran them over by mistake. I was 11 or 12 when this happened, details are fuzzy, but I do remember the story.
Ever since then we've all been doomed with having a bus monitor check under the bus 3 friggin times to eb sure there aren't any kids under there.
A girl got killed by a school bus, and I’m pretty sure it was Buddy’s solution to have parents volunteer to be bus monitors. It’s been going on ever since
So fucking stupid. Huge waste of time. Buy cameras and be done with it. These muffin-topped drivers can't get in and out in any sort of efficiency.
I have seen bus safety evolve from nothing to where we are today. Did kids get run over in my day? Yes. Do kids get run over today? Yes.
The thought behind the under check is they think a child could fall there and not be seen...but of course the monitor was there to make sure that did not happen so why look. Because parents are involved and no matter how well you explain that given a million chances a day for 180 days a year an accident will occur. So we bring safety beyond the absurd and when it goes wrong parents still want someone to blame while odds are sooner or later it had to happen.
> Do kids get run over today? Yes.
Have there been incidents since monitors were added?
Yes. Look it up online. Not in RI/MA but odds will swing our way at some point. It just takes two errors really. The bus driver is watching the kids. The kid runs back for his bag when the bus monitor is climbing the stairs to the bus. The point is you can do a thousand things to create better safety but at some point the answers run out.
> Not in RI/MA
Isn't that the point? I wasn't thinking that RI having bus monitors would stop accidents in Arkansas.
Arkansas I assume also has bus monitors, like pretty much every other state. Do you see the point now?
No, not really.
I see you saying that kids still get run over, then saying it hasn't happened in RI, then guessing about other what happens in other states. All I was asking was to see your source for saying that monitors don't do anything. Surely you read something about kids still getting run over despite monitors and that's what you're basing your opinion on and not just pulling it out of your ass, right? Because that would be silly.
Absurd? Ok Buddy, you’re just looking for something to be angry about.
Are you trying to buy an argument? That's a different section but if you go to social issues you can also find abuse if needed.
flyingthrghhconcrete t1_iy80bex wrote
It's been a thing for a while. 30ish years ago they showed us a video of a young kid chasing a dropped item under the bus and the driver not seeing them and getting squished. Based on a few real occurrences in the news. The message was, don't be that kid. The district had monitors on the elementary buses but not upper grades.