This morning, the newspapers had the story of yet another school child coming under the wheels of his own school bus and dying. The heart breaks to read these instances. School bus accidents causing injury and even death of the very students they are supposed to ferry around have become a regular feature. Most of these accidents are caused when the buses are reversing or picking up or dropping the kids back at their homes. Or in the case of that unlucky child, due to critical head injuries caused when his head accidently hit a banner on a lamp post because he stuck his head out the bus while it was reversing.
The most disturbing thing about all these accidents is that they have mainly been caused by negligence.
School bus norms have been put in place, and these will be legislated by July 31 according to news reports. The state has also initiated a sensitizing programme to train bus drivers in basic safety norms. But the norms are clearly not enough.
The brat doesn't go by school bus. I pick and drop him up myself, despite the fact that this severely limits my workday. This isn't always practical, of course, if one lives far from school or if one is a working parent and I do understand that. And it isn't the solution. I chose to do the school pick and drop for reasons other than school bus safety, and more for the sake of convenience, especially given that he does go for post school activity four times a week and that timing does not have a bus pick up. And I shudder at how the ubiquitious van wallahs handle the children, shepherding them like cattle across the trafficked street that the school is in, and with the kids raising Cain, oblivious to the clear and present danger of getting mowed down by oncoming traffic.
I see kids from various schools getting off from their buses and walking off home on their own. And these are tiny tots. Barely five or six years old. No adult escorting them back home. Some of them start walking off without looking whether the buses are reversing in order to turn out of the lanes. In our previous building where this happened, the child was a latchkey child, barely six, and luckily we had good security staff who ensured that the child reached his home safely, and any other mothers who happened to be at the gate kept an eye out too. But it terrified me.
Call me anxiety prone, but I do believe as much as it is the school's job to ensure there are responsible trained attendants in the bus, there should be a responsible adult to pick a child younger than 10-12 from the gate.
As parents we need to be more proactive in insisting that the school authorities have drivers who are trained as well as trained attendants in the bus. Some schools ensure that a couple of teachers are in each and every bus and that helps ensure the children behave and attendants are more watchful. We need to ride occasionally in the school buses to see how they deal with the children, how careful the drivers and attendants are, report rash drivers, keep an eye out if we come across instances of unsafe parking, reversing and such instances. We need to check the buses for wire mesh on windows to ensure the kids can't put their heads, hands, etc out. Our children travel in these, if we don't pay attention to potential danger in these, who will?
But first we need parents who are aware and concerned about child safety. We have parents who pick up their kids from school and let the kid stand half out through the sun roof while they zip away with foot applying great pressure on the accelerator. Because it is cool. Parents who walk with the child on the side facing oncoming traffic. Parents who aren't bothered about the importance of ensuring the child has a helmet if on a two wheeler or if the toddler is sitting in the front seat without wearing a seat belt. We even have parents who keep their babies in their laps while they drive. I've seen these and more and I despair.
And until us parents don't start getting more particular about our children's safety, I don't see much changing. As for these school buses and the poor children who have come under them, my heart goes out to their parents. No one should lose a child to such mishaps.
The most disturbing thing about all these accidents is that they have mainly been caused by negligence.
School bus norms have been put in place, and these will be legislated by July 31 according to news reports. The state has also initiated a sensitizing programme to train bus drivers in basic safety norms. But the norms are clearly not enough.
The brat doesn't go by school bus. I pick and drop him up myself, despite the fact that this severely limits my workday. This isn't always practical, of course, if one lives far from school or if one is a working parent and I do understand that. And it isn't the solution. I chose to do the school pick and drop for reasons other than school bus safety, and more for the sake of convenience, especially given that he does go for post school activity four times a week and that timing does not have a bus pick up. And I shudder at how the ubiquitious van wallahs handle the children, shepherding them like cattle across the trafficked street that the school is in, and with the kids raising Cain, oblivious to the clear and present danger of getting mowed down by oncoming traffic.
I see kids from various schools getting off from their buses and walking off home on their own. And these are tiny tots. Barely five or six years old. No adult escorting them back home. Some of them start walking off without looking whether the buses are reversing in order to turn out of the lanes. In our previous building where this happened, the child was a latchkey child, barely six, and luckily we had good security staff who ensured that the child reached his home safely, and any other mothers who happened to be at the gate kept an eye out too. But it terrified me.
Call me anxiety prone, but I do believe as much as it is the school's job to ensure there are responsible trained attendants in the bus, there should be a responsible adult to pick a child younger than 10-12 from the gate.
As parents we need to be more proactive in insisting that the school authorities have drivers who are trained as well as trained attendants in the bus. Some schools ensure that a couple of teachers are in each and every bus and that helps ensure the children behave and attendants are more watchful. We need to ride occasionally in the school buses to see how they deal with the children, how careful the drivers and attendants are, report rash drivers, keep an eye out if we come across instances of unsafe parking, reversing and such instances. We need to check the buses for wire mesh on windows to ensure the kids can't put their heads, hands, etc out. Our children travel in these, if we don't pay attention to potential danger in these, who will?
But first we need parents who are aware and concerned about child safety. We have parents who pick up their kids from school and let the kid stand half out through the sun roof while they zip away with foot applying great pressure on the accelerator. Because it is cool. Parents who walk with the child on the side facing oncoming traffic. Parents who aren't bothered about the importance of ensuring the child has a helmet if on a two wheeler or if the toddler is sitting in the front seat without wearing a seat belt. We even have parents who keep their babies in their laps while they drive. I've seen these and more and I despair.
And until us parents don't start getting more particular about our children's safety, I don't see much changing. As for these school buses and the poor children who have come under them, my heart goes out to their parents. No one should lose a child to such mishaps.
