A mother is accusing a school bus driver of targeting her daughter in a viral series of TikToks posted Sept. 29.
A video recounting her experience of the matter has gained user @witchylyse, or Alyse, 176,000 views, with subsequent videos also garnering a collective 30,000 views.
Alyse said that her school district’s transportation service—the district is not named—has no record of any incidents involving her daughter. However, she received an email from her daughter’s assistant principal alleging that her daughter had misbehaved on the school bus on a day she wasn’t even in school.
“It stated that Grace was written up on the bus yesterday, Tuesday, Sept. 28, for dancing in the aisle ways and standing up even though the bus driver had repeatedly told her to sit down,” she said. “Now normally, I would be very upset with my child because she knows the rules about being in a moving vehicle. However, I got to thinking, it would be really hard for Grace to do that on Tuesday, Sept. 28, because she wasn’t even at school yesterday.”
When she went to the transportation provider, they said they had no record of any complaints against her daughter from the bus driver, just the complaints she had made against the bus driver herself.
“In fact, the only record that they had pertaining to Grace in their system about Grace and transportation and the bus driver and anything was the multiple times I have called to complain on this same bus driver for neglecting and allowing other children to physically harm my child.” she said. “Because last year, Grace came home a week straight for one student who was continually bullying her, and the bus driver intentionally sitting them together.”
She then says that the bus driver had previously waited to alert the school of an incident of bullying which resulted in her daughter’s lip being busted open, then reported the incident incorrectly to the school.
Alyse told the Daily Dot that those who know her and her child personally have been supportive, knowing that she does not seek out conflict. However, some of those who aren’t as close to the situation have not been so supportive.
“I would say like 90% of the people who have had comments on this situation have just kind of said, we support you, and then there’s those few that are like, ’you’re a terrible mom for putting her on the bus.’” she said. “I’ve explained that a few times but I’ve only put her on the bus one time, but I’m also not going to deprive her of something that she wants to do, because somebody else doesn’t want to parent their child or because an adult wants to bully a nine-year-old.”
When she confronted the bus driver, she said that he bus driver began apologizing profusely and said she meant to write up a different kid, but Alyse wasn’t buying it.
“Now I would believe that, but one little detail: she did in fact write up my child because the principal directly emailed me this morning and told me that the write up is directly about Grace,” she said.
She added that if the driver had made a mistake with the paperwork, she would have also submitted the incorrect paperwork to her bosses at the transportation department. Protocol requires drivers to submit incidents to both the school and transportation. She reiterated that the transportation department never received a report about her daughter, leading her to believe the write up was targeted.
Alyse told the Daily Dot that her goal in posting the video was not just to complain about the district, but to bring awareness to anti-bullying policies which she says are not being enforced, either due to “lack of evidence,” or COVID-19 staffing shortages.
“I’m not going to stand back like my parents and allow [bullying] to unfold to the point that she literally resents and hates school,” Alyse said. “I think it’s important that this brought awareness to the schools that are messing up right now.”
Alyse also said in a video that at this point, the situation is in the hands of the school district, the transportation authority, and her lawyers.
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