Mom claims late school bus forced her to change son’s academic schedule

NEW HANOVER COUNTY, NC (WWAY) — It’s not the first time we’ve heard about a school bus being late this school year, but one New Hanover County mom says things have gotten so bad, she’s had to switch her son’s class schedule at Noble Middle School.

Shiloh Gauss says her 8th-grader got so behind in his advanced math class, she had to pull him out of the first period class because his bus was consistently making him late.

“I had to pull him out of that because he’s never there,” Gauss said. “And you just cannot be in an advanced class and not be there.”

Gauss says the problem started in September when her son’s bus would show up extremely late or not at all. She says she started calling the school to ask what was going on.

“They said, ‘Was he there the whole time?’ I said, ‘Yeah, he’s been standing there the whole time. I have cameras,'” Gauss said. “And they said, ‘Oh, okay, well I guess she has cameras.'”

Gauss says her son can be, and has been left waiting outside for as long as an hour and 15 minutes. She says she even tried to see if she could switch around her son’s schedule, but the school said no.

“I did ask if he could take an elective class or something, P.E., or have something in the morning,” Gauss said. “But they can’t rearrange everyone’s schedule for the bus situation.”

Gauss says she kept getting letters sent home about her son falling behind.

We reached out to New Hanover County Schools. They shared the following statement:

“New Hanover County Schools understands the value and importance of instructional time. Though we are unable to discuss individual students, based on review of the bus in question, GPS log for the past several weeks has shown the bus arriving on time.  We encourage the parent to contact the school to see what is happening.”

Gauss’ patience, however, is running low.

“We are at the point where we are looking at an online charter school,” she said. “We are looking at home schooling. We are looking at private schools. We are looking at other solutions.”

WWAY does not know if this situation has been caused by the ongoing bus driver shortage at New Hanover County Schools. However, county officials have confirmed that the district is 20 drivers short and is actively looking to fill the spots.