A Georgia father is outraged after his kindergarten daughter was left behind in school for the third time
A video showing an understandably irate dad went viral after he chastised school officials for misplacing his 5-year-old daughter, not once, not twice but three times
An upset Georgia parent tore into administrators at his child’s school, claiming that a bus had left his 5-year-old daughter behind for the third time, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
Tristan King had a few choice words for staff at R.L. Norton Elementary School in Snellville, Ga., and went on a strongly-worded tirade about how his kindergartener was left behind while the school bus carried other kids home. Something he said has happened one too many times.
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“You all allow these buses to come pick these kids up, therefore you’re responsible,” the infuriated father says to a staffer. “When I release my child to get on your bus to come to your school — until my child makes it home to my door, you’re responsible for my child.”
A school resource officer tried to calm King down and asked him to stop shouting because of other kids nearby.
“No! I don’t care!” King yelled. “Y’all didn’t care nothing about my child when she went missing for three times. This is the third time, and you wanna talk to me about someone else’s kids, and you didn’t care about mine?
“No. Don’t ask me to be calm,” he adds. “Don’t patronize me. Don’t chastise me.”
After King’s confrontation with school officials went viral, on Friday, school officials apologized, and admitted that things “wasn’t handled well.”
“Mr. King had every right to be upset, and the whole thing was not handled well,” Sloan Roach, a spokeswoman for Gwinnett County Public Schools, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in a statement. “School officials have reviewed things on their end and some new policies and procedures have been put in place.”
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To make matters worse, the outraged father said he was forbidden by Gwinnett County Police and the Schools (SRO) from returning to the school again on his own because of his temperament.
But a school resource officer said King’s claim was untrue.
“The resource officer told Mr. King that if he didn’t calm down and refrain from using profanity, that’s something that could happen. The principal has no desire to pursue that action.”
King said earlier in the school year, the same incident occurred but because school was just starting off, they didn’t complain about it.
“We didn’t make a big deal about it the first time,” he told the Journal-Constitution. “School had just started and everyone was getting used to the routine.”
However, the second time it occurred when his daughter was left behind was in January.
School officials called and informed King and his wife but they were both working more than an hour away and couldn’t get their child by 4 p.m. A family member, however was able to scoop the girl up.
There become proactive in trying to ensure that their daughter made it on the bus everyday. They even got their son a cellphone to call, and they worked with teachers to ensure that he escorted her to the bus everyday.
However, the third time was not a charm for the Kings. It’s a nightmare and they are fed up that the bus situation has not been nipped in the bud.
“I haven’t spoken to anyone,” he said. “I’m worried that this is an epidemic that has been swept under the rug.”
Others on social media agreed that officials need to be held accountable.
“So why do these people still have jobs?,” one person wrote on Facebook. “Why isn’t the protocol for 5 year olds tighter. These people are a joke, but you want to be afraid of a dad who’s there for his kid? WTF. I hope the family had legal recourse.”
Officials have offered to make things right by ensuring that King’s daughter is escorted to the bus everyday along with her older brother. It is unclear if King and his wife will take legal action.
