Bus drops boy 15 miles away

When 6-year-old Seth Foreman couldn't find his bus — bus No. 28 — Friday afternoon at Northside Elementary School in Nebraska City, he found the next best thing — bus No. 24 — and climbed aboard.

It was sound logic for a first-grader. But the ride ended when the bus driver dropped Seth at the end of the route, a post office in Union, Neb., some 15 miles from home.

The incident has left both Bethanie O'Flaherty, Seth's mom, and Nebraska City Public Schools administrators trying to figure out how such a thing could happen.

O'Flaherty has taken her son out of the public school and enrolled him in Lourdes Central Catholic School, where he'll start school Wednesday. He had gone to the school for the past three years, including for preschool and kindergarten.

Nebraska City students in grades K-8 went back to school Wednesday. Friday was Seth's third day in a new school.

“I'm still pretty upset,” his mom said Tuesday. “I just don't know how that kind of thing could happen. He told the bus driver he didn't live there. Why wasn't I called? It's 2010, it's not like there's no way to communicate.”

Jeffrey Edwards, superintendent of the Nebraska City Public Schools, also is trying to determine what happened last Friday. He met with O'Flaherty Monday and apologized.

“It was definitely a mistake and not a typical thing that happens in the Nebraska City Public Schools,” he said.

Edwards said he's still investigating how Seth got on the wrong bus, including whether systems in place to ensure that students take the correct bus were in use. The district also is reviewing those procedures and adding a triple-check to make sure students are on the right buses before they leave the school.

He said he also is still trying to get to the bottom of why Seth was left in Union. The driver apparently communicated with an employee at the bus barn. He's investigating what that communication involved and what information was given to the driver.

Also part of that investigation is whether any disciplinary action will be taken against the driver, who has served as a substitute in the past and just took over the route this year.

O'Flaherty said Seth told the driver before he dropped him off that he didn't live in Union. O'Flaherty lives about 7 miles west of Nebraska City; Union lies to the north.

A construction worker saw the boy walking along U.S. Highway 34, crying. Seth gave the man his mom's name and number. The man helped him call O'Flaherty, who drove to get him.

The Nebraska City district owns its own buses and employs the drivers. Edwards estimated that about 350 students ride the bus every day.

“This is every administrator's worst nightmare,” he said.


Correction: In an earlier version of this story, the number of the bus Seth boarded was incorrect.

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