Mom wants bus monitor fired over incident with autistic child

Tijuana Jones-Stubbs went to the bus stop Thursday afternoon because she had heard the proper procedure was not being followed in dropping off her autistic child at day care.

She sat in her car with her cellphone recording a bus monitor escorting her child. The child is supposed to be dropped off "hand-to-hand," Jones-Stubbs said. That means an adult and is supposed to directly hand off the child to an adult at the day care. She was told that the child was just being pushed into the building and left without anyone inside taking custody.

She said she had no idea what she was actually about to witness and was shocked.

"I wasn't expecting this at all," she said.

As a result of her video, the bus monitor, who hasn't been named, was placed on administrative leave.

The video shows the bus monitor getting off the bus with the child, 6-year-old Tahir Weaver, who has minimal speaking ability. He dropped to the ground and the monitor can be heard yelling "get up" at him. When he didn't, she picked him up by an arm and a leg and carried him, dangling upside down, across the road. She then sat him back on the ground and yelled at him to stand up before walking him, as he screamed, into the day care.

"My thoughts were 'What is this woman doing, and why didn't you try to find a better way to get him across the street,'" she said, as Tahir sat quietly beside her at her apartment.

The video then ended because Jones-Stubbs said she walked inside and confronted the monitor.

"She said she was just trying to get him across the street," Jones-Stubbs said. "I told her she should find a better way."

She does not know the monitor's name.

Jones-Stubbs said the monitor should have put the child back on the bus and gotten someone from the day care to help when Tahir became uncooperative. At the least, she said, the monitor could have held the small-framed child more gently as she carried him across the road.

She thinks the monitor should be fired.

"I don't think she needs to be working with children, if you don't have the patience," Jones-Stubbs said. "I think you need to find something else better to do."

School district spokeswoman Stephanie Hartley said the monitor is on leave pending an investigation. She said the district is looking into the matter to make sure it doesn't happen again.

Hartley said that if a parent is concerned about how a child is treated, the parent should contact the school district so that an investigation may be opened.

Jones-Stubbs said Tahir is generally well-behaved and mostly acts up around people he doesn't trust. That tells her the trouble with the bus monitor was not just about what happened Thursday. She said he hasn't had any trouble with other bus personnel.

To contact writer Wayne Crenshaw, call 256-9725.

This story was originally published November 21, 2015 at 6:22 PM with the headline "Mom wants bus monitor fired over incident with autistic child ."