6 YEAR OLD PLACED ON WRONG BUS THINKS IT'S HIS FAULT

PEOPLE

 

6-Year-Old Was Put on Wrong Bus After School Got Out, Then 'Cried' Back at Home 'Because He Thought It Was His Fault'

By Susan Young  Published on November 14, 2025 08:22PM EST

 

A Maryland mom was shocked when she received a phone call from her child's school saying her 6-year-old son had been dropped off at the wrong location.

 

Shatira Gray told CBS station WJZ that she was supposed to pick up her son Jeremiah at a daycare center on Wednesday, Nov. 12 — something she said she told Victory Villa Elementary about in advance.

 

However, that afternoon she got a call from the office telling her that her son ended up getting on the wrong bus — and that there was another parent with him, who was the one to call the school.

 

"So you're telling me, my son is with a random person," she recalled saying during that phone call.

 

Charles Herndon, a spokesman for Baltimore County Public Schools, tells PEOPLE it was a "miscommunication" that was handled quickly.

 

“It was communicated to the school that he was to be put on the bus and there was some miscommunication about what bus the family was talking about,” Herndon tells PEOPLE.

 

Instead of being placed on the bus going to daycare, Herndon says that Jeremiah was placed on his assigned bus that takes him to his neighborhood bus stop.

 

From the stop, students are typically either picked up by a caregiver or they walk home.

 

Herndon says Jeremiah was on the neighborhood bus with his classmates — and one of them took him home. Then, that student's parent then called the school. The school then notified Jeremiah’s mom and school staff picked him up and brought him back to the school, where he was picked up by his family.

 

Gray, who told WJZ she was far away when she first learned what happened, told the CBS station that school officials called her after they reached her son.

 

"I said, 'Jeremiah, can you let me know what happened?' " she recalled. "He said, 'A lady put him on the bus.' "

 

Gray told the station that her son has never taken his assigned bus to his neighborhood as he's either dropped off or picked up directly from school or the daycare facility.

 

"My grandson cried when he got home because he thought it was his fault that he got dropped off that bus at the wrong location," his grandmother told the outlet.

 

This is not the first time a child in the Baltimore County Public Schools district has been placed on the wrong bus. Just last summer, WJZ reported that a 6-year-old kindergartener with special needs was mistakenly placed on a school bus after the first day of summer school at Pleasant Plains Elementary School.

 

Gray told WJZ that the school was apologetic and said they are working on taking new measures to make sure this doesn't happen again.