It was the perfect storm of circumstances: a school with a common name, a new school bus driver, and a student who travels out of his district to attend school.
Seven-year-old Jacob Pempeit and his mom Ashley were homeless last year and since Jacob doesn’t live near his school, he gets bussed to Central Primary School in Snohomish, Washington every day thanks to the McKinney-Vento Act. It ensures that homeless children receive transportation to the school that they were last enrolled in.
But the new bus driver was given directions by the dispatcher to a school of the same name in Ferndale, Washington. The town is less than 30 kilometres south of the Canadian border and nearly 130 kilometres in the wrong direction from Jacob’s school.
“He came home that night and just randomly said, ‘Mom I went to Canada today!'” Ashley Pempeit told King 5 News.
“It was the wrong school,” said Jacob.
Officials are calling the mishap an “honest mistake” because of the long distances bus drivers take children every day.
But Ashley is upset that the situation happened at all.
“Why would you not question taking a child so far away?” she said. “There’s no way they’re getting to school on time, and that’s the whole point. How would you not question that from the get go?”
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