Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
There was an incident yesterday where a child was waiting after school for the parent. At 5:39 p.m. the principal had to leave. The student was still there waiting on the parent and there is no after school program. Come to find out, the mother did not provide her new cell phone number and work number to the school. Is this something that you as teachers see common from parents and being in your profession, is this something legally that has to be reported to child services? I consider this child neglect, not only for not picking the child up on time but not having any way for the school to contact the parent. Also, the child, who is 14, did not have the updated contact info for his own mother. Very sad situation.
IME, it's not unusual to have outdated information from parents when they move or change phone information. Sometimes it feels intentional from the parents and other times it appears accidental. I hope nothing happened to that parent who didn't show up. If this happens frequently, I would say it's neglect. If it's a one-time thing and there is a reason (car accident, some major event that won't repeat). But you would think a responsible parent would call, if at all possible.
I don't know the situation, but I would hope that if it was a rare event for this parent, the school wouldn't create an situation where there needed be one. I recall a time when, for various reasons we couldn't control, there were hundreds of us stuck in a parking lot waiting for cars to start moving. We were there over two hours and quite a few parents were starting to freak out over their kids and the per minute charges the school would hit them with. And not a thing any of us could do to get things moving except wait.
There was an incident yesterday where a child was waiting after school for the parent. At 5:39 p.m. the principal had to leave. .
Well that's a bizarre quitting time. LOL
But seriously, any child under age 18 left at school should be considered abandoned and special services should be called. Poor kid. Poor mom. You have to wonder what led to the situation.
At my school that would require a call to child services. When children have not been picked up on time, if the teacher or admins cannot stay, law enforcement is called to stay with the child until parents arrive. They usually immediately call child services as well.
There was an incident yesterday where a child was waiting after school for the parent. At 5:39 p.m. the principal had to leave. The student was still there waiting on the parent and there is no after school program. Come to find out, the mother did not provide her new cell phone number and work number to the school. Is this something that you as teachers see common from parents and being in your profession, is this something legally that has to be reported to child services? I consider this child neglect, not only for not picking the child up on time but not having any way for the school to contact the parent. Also, the child, who is 14, did not have the updated contact info for his own mother. Very sad situation.
Used to happen all the time in my school, which had a lot of lower-income parents. Phone numbers seemed to change every week, and we never had a current one. Many parents just didn't seem at all concerned about where their kids were, or maybe they were too busy with work at menial jobs that they desperately needed to be concerned about a child who was at least in a relatively safe place, even if they weren't supposed to be there anymore. And it was elementary school. I wouldn't bother child services with it - that's not going to help the child or the parent; only make their lives more difficult than they already are. 14 is old enough, anyway. I had 6 year olds sitting at school until 7pm, and even we didn't call child services. I think that kind of thing is just a reality of people living in poverty.
Typically, a teacher would stay, and if we had to leave we'd break the rules and drive the kid home.
There was an incident yesterday where a child was waiting after school for the parent. At 5:39 p.m. the principal had to leave. The student was still there waiting on the parent and there is no after school program. Come to find out, the mother did not provide her new cell phone number and work number to the school. Is this something that you as teachers see common from parents and being in your profession, is this something legally that has to be reported to child services? I consider this child neglect, not only for not picking the child up on time but not having any way for the school to contact the parent. Also, the child, who is 14, did not have the updated contact info for his own mother. Very sad situation.
Offhand, if this was a simple situation of a 14 year old child waiting after school for the parent, I wouldn't understand why the school would care. There is no requirement that 14 year olds must have parents pick them up from school within a certain length of time. They might walk home, they might go to a friends house, they might take the bus, etc. I also wouldn't see why the principal would have to wait with the 14 year old until the parent came. Maybe I'm not ascertaining the situation right. They might have after school activities. The school can't be expected to keep track of each and every kid.
14 is about the age for a freshman in high school, right?
I suspect this is more of a homeless student / transitional housing student / etc...
At my school that would require a call to child services. When children have not been picked up on time, if the teacher or admins cannot stay, law enforcement is called to stay with the child until parents arrive. They usually immediately call child services as well.
At my school that would require a call to child services. When children have not been picked up on time, if the teacher or admins cannot stay, law enforcement is called to stay with the child until parents arrive. They usually immediately call child services as well.
At the elementary level the school would call the police to come to pick up the child if the parents were extremely late (perhaps an hour or two late, or earlier, if no one could stay with them) and we could not get a hold of anyone connected to the child. I believe that the police would then call CPS. If the parents were regularly late, even by a half hour or so, CPS may be contacted.
Now, with a 14 year old, I really doubt if the school would even take responsibility for a child that old, unless it was a safety situation such as freezing cold weather. Middle school and high school students just leave the building after school ends and then can walk home or whatever. They are not monitored.
I bet that it was a situation like an after school club or something where the teacher had responsibility for the child until the parent came. Again, if no one could stay with the child and the contact info was not accurate the police would be called to handle the situation.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
