BONITA SPRINGS, Fla. — A Bonita Springs mother says her five-year-old son, a special needs student, was left on a school bus for nearly three hours.
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Sheena Presnell sent her son, Matthew, off to San Carlos Park Elementary School around 7 AM like any other morning, but then she got an alarming call.
"I got a call that he was absent, and I was like, is this a mistake? So of course my heart dropped. I called the school. What upset me the most was that she said, am I sure I put my son on the bus? That's what she told me. Of course, I put my son on the bus," Presnell said.
According to Presnell, she received a notification that her son’s I.D. was scanned when he got on the bus and again when he supposedly arrived at school. However, while at work, she received a call from the school’s automated system informing her that Matthew was absent. A few minutes later, the school notified her that Matthew had fallen asleep on the bus and had only just been discovered.
Last year, the Lee County School District spent more than a million dollars on implementing an I.D. scanning system to track when students got on and off school buses. However, Presnell questioned the system's reliability, given the false notification she received.
"What they told me was that they did a mass scan. So how do we know that our kids are actually at the school if they're just doing a mass scan?" Presnell said.
The School District of Lee County responded by confirming that Matthew had been taken along another bus route before being returned to school. They emphasized that Matthew was never alone, as he was supervised by two adults the entire time. The district is still reviewing what happened and did not confirm if they are indeed conducting mass scans.
Presnell says she's not happy with the district’s response and has since stopped sending Matthew to school.
"If he's able to come to a school closer to home, that's all I've been wanting since the beginning of the school year," Presnell explained.
The school has invited Presnell and her family to view the bus ride footage, which they plan to do on Wednesday.
