Would You Let Your Child Walk to School Alone?

The powers that be built an entire school complex (K-12 with a Double middle school) 6 miles towards an island on a penninsula: traffic is a big slow snarl on a 2-lane road. We don't need parents' cars in that line-up too. Kids need to ride the bus, that's what our tax dollars pay for. Like it or not, I rode the bus in the 70's & half of the 80's. It's part of the school years, good, bad or ugly. Kids need to learn we all do things we don't want to every day, that's part of life. Keep the traffic lighter to we can get to work. Kids don't need to drive rither, unless they have after school jobs to go to, not because its "cool". Have some consideration for people who pay taxes to run the buses whether they have kids on them or not!

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My daughter is only 3 and a half right now and we only live about 3/4 of a mile away from the junior high & the high school...no way will she walk to school. Way to many whackos out there!

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Buses where I live picks up our children, no matter how close or far one lives, even if you live on the same street as the school, but then it's up to the parents if they want their child to ride the bus or not, etc.....we live in a safe community, I think, but then the other day a note was sent home.....a male exposed himself to a child at a school bus stop. That is sick, but then there are sick people out there.....no child is safe.....just talk to your child about "what could happen" and watch them.

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after reading some of these many concerns of parents on these comments i felt the need to say something. I am a teen, who has walked to school since she was 12, and have never had an issue. Even today, while my high school is too far away to walk, i walk to my bus stop every day. Sadly, while it is still possible for a child or teen to be abducted, if you prepare your children the right way, as my parents did myself, if a situation may arise your child knows how to handle it. my cell phone is always within my reach. I know who to call and when.I know that i should walk on the busy streets where the cars and people are not the quiet empty ones. I live in a pretty safe area, but this safe area was shaken the year after i graduated from middle school- a sexual offender kept trying to get girls from my middle school, even some i knew, to get in his car with him. they were all smart not to thank goodness. and for a minute my mom drove me to my bus stop until the man was aprehended. Kids need to grow up( i felt being able to walk to school was such a grown up thing at the time) and one way in which to do that is to let them walk to school, and this can be done safely, if parents prepare their kids and when they know when to not let them walk. if you dont live in a safe area, dont let them! Wait until they are about 12, and/ or responsible to handle things like memorizing the route and having a cell phone i dont think kids from my generation need to have scary messages drilled into them- it only scares us away from doing other things like walking to places along the school route. We understand not everyone in the world is good, but we also know there are a lot of people that are. please dont take this as a teen critizing parents, but as tips from a teen from this generation. Also know, there arent just dangers in walking to school but on public transport that some children/teens take to school/ I did have one bad experience on a city bus. i was stand and holding on to a pole, i was by myself on my way home from school, when the bus stopped short, and i started to fall backwards, and has i did a middle aged man reached out and groped my buttocks, but made it seem as though he was helping me back on my feet. i did the smart thing and walked to the back of that bus. So don't just think perverts are just on kids walking to school routes.

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I have read the recommended Economist article and it is shocking what kind of basically innocent people get on the sex offender registries, people who had sex with an underage boyfriend or girlfriend, or who urinated in public so they wouldn't wet their pants. Yet dangerous muggers can live right next to a school, they don't get on any registry, or people guilty of assault and battery, even injuring someone, even murdering, when they are released. Let's vote against all polititians who are against making these laws fair. And I am not soft on child molesters, I was once kidnapped by a child molester, but I escaped. I am more traumatized by the evil bullies in our school. I would not be surprised if some of them grew up to be horrible robbers or beating their children bloody but because it it not sexual, they don't get on the registry.

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One reason it was safe for kids to walk to school years ago was because creeps who preyed on children were locked up in mental hospitals before they could do any harm. People who showed an abnormal attraction to children or acted strangely toward them were reported, which the person was examined by a psychiatrist. If the person was found to have a sexual attraction to children, he was committed to a mental institution. But 25-30 years ago, under pressure from "advocacy" groups who maintained that no person should be held against his will unless he has been proven to have committed a crime, the mental hospitals were emptied, and all the pedophiles started preying on children. Now we have this epidemic of pedophilia, which children now have a two in three chance of being molested by the time he or she reaches 14 years. Children no longer are safe outside their own homes. It's gotten to the point that this state now mandates that anyone working for a school, child care center, summer camp, etc. must be fingerprinted and photographed as part of the criminal background check.

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hell yea poot. I am sorry for all your children, you yuppy, paranoid, wusses. The chance of your child getting attacked is very slim. and not every sex offender is a child molester. Half the people who are sex offenders are listed as such for absolute bullshit. My friend was listed as such because a girl decided she would call rape on him when he refused to do ANYTHING with her. She wasnt his type, so she retaliated. guess what? he is in the registry now. and honestly, you are NOT helping your child by making them ignorant to the world around them, and over coddling them. they need independence to become they're own person.
and also, someone is not a bad parent for allowing their child to walk to and from school. My mother was an excellent mother. She did everything she could for us and more. But guess what, she was a single mother, struggling to make ends meet. so she worked all day, mostly in retail. you cant "arrange your schedule around buses" with jobs like that. you just cant. and I'm glad I grew up like that. because unlike your kids who will be sitting at home with their fingers up their asses throughout their entire twenties because they were overeprotected to the point of no independence, I have my own place, by myself, and am completely independent at age 21, and have been since i was 21. if you do everything for them, you are going to ruin what little chance of independence a person has now a days with conformist tv, and conformist thoughts.

Your overprotectiveness is whats going to get them hurt. no "stranger lurking around the corner".

GET OVER YOURSELVES, YOU BLOODY YUPPY WUSSES.

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I am 43 years old so I was obviously a child myself when the poor Patz child disappeared and my mother NEVER EVER let us go to school on our own until we reached HS. As far as I am concerned his mother was just LAZY!!! How the hell do you let your 6 yo walk to the bus alone!! That poor child suffered lord knows what because his dumb ass mother couldn't walk him to the bus stop. She'll be suffering for the rest of her life and rightly so as far as I'm concerned!

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Working as a school crossing guard, I see children accompanied by their parents walking to school, being driven to school by their parents, children riding the bus and definately children riding bikes and walking alone or in groups to and from school every day. The biggest issue is the traffic and the danger it poses to the children. Parents that really think they are protecting their child by accompanying them to school, lead their children by the hand straight into the middle of the street with a massive amount of speeding oncoming cars (jay walking) rather than teaching their child to use the crosswalk, and to obey their crossing guard. Christa mentioned she tells her children not to obey authority figures as they cannot be trusted? Obviously this is why my job is so hard when the parents don't obey me in front of their children, and they teach their children not to speak to strangers which seems to include me, because some children don't even answer me when I ask if they need to cross.
There is a law in California which is an infraction, if you disobey a crossing guard. I've noticed the traffic is very heavy and the parents are speeding and disregarding traffic laws, racing to beat me when I walk out to stop them. They drive right over the crosswalk violating my stop sign, driving up the wrong side of the street to pass other parents in line, etc. This is a different world than I grew up in. People used to stop and let you walk without a crosswalk even, which I always thought was normal. I never see that anymore. As far as predators...yes there have been attempts by "gardner type men in a van" in my school neighborhood. The sheriff dept. alerted me and I kept an active look out. I am very watchful of every child around me when I am on duty. I am also a parent but my kids are now adults, but I watch for suspicious activity around the children and school and everywhere I go. Back in the 60's-70's I walked to school every day of my life. We had bullys back when I was a kid, not perverts. My children walked to school some of the time during the 80's, but that is when reports of child abuse, molest and abduction were introduced. I was very paranoid myself especially in retail stores, public parks, Chuck E. Cheese child type restaurants, outdoor festivals, fairs, etc., but not so worried about them walking to school with groups of parents and kids walking down the same streets ahead of them or behind them. Just try to teach your children right from wrong, correct overall social behavior, maybe self defense would be good, and most of all let them be kids.

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The way to make our streets much safer is to have mandatory life imprisonment for all rapists, child molesters, robbers, batterers, wife beaters, people who torture their children. Then there will be no need for a sex offender registry. Some people are on the sex registry just because they had sex with a slightly younger underage girlfriend or boyfriend or urinating in public. Then they don't have freedom where to live, they are ostracised, harassed, have trouble finding a job. Most sex registries don't make it clear what they were convicted of. Yet muggers can live next to a school, no registry for them. Is that fair? We need to build more prisons, and never release dangerous violent offenders.

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My children are 16 years apart. I walked my son to school often, but in that 16 years, much has changed. None of us walk anymore, sadly!
www.youravon.com/psummey

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Horrible things can and do happen but why is that? Perhaps if people weren't complete strangers with each other things like child abduction wouldn't happen as often. I mean seriously how many people can say they know their neighbors? How many people drop in on their neighbors to visit? I think that if people came out of their little bubbles more often creeps would be rooted out more quickly, there would be less fear because you would know the people your kids walk by every day to school.

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As a mother of three AND as a school bus driver, I think that it is okay for neighborhood children to walk to school or to the bus stop if they are 7,8 or 9 years old. Our school district requires all kindergarten children to be met by a responsible person on both ends of their bus ride. The parent decides who is responsible enough to meet their child. If a young child is not met or if any child is uncomfortable getting off the bus unescorted, we keep them on the bus and return them to school where the parent is called.
Many parents walk their children to the bus stop and meet the bus in the afternoon. There are generally enough parents that those who can't meet their children know that there is someone from their neighborhood who is there and watching all the children everyday.
The sad part is that the buses are not running at full capacity. School district funds are being spent to provide safe and dependable transportation for children and yet parents do not avail themselves of this asset. It is much easier to walk (or even drive) to the bus stop than it is to fight the traffic in and around the school. It is a proven fact that children are much safer on the school bus than they are in parents cars.
The bottom line is, if you have buses, use them. If you don't have bus service or are not comfortable allowing your child to walk, walk with them. Form groups from your neighborhood. Get to know the other parents and take turns. Work it out to the best for all concerned. You are their parent and it is your decision. Decide wisely for your child.

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DON`T YOU JUST LOVE GETTING BEHIND A SCHOOL BUS THAT STOPS AT EVERY OTHER HOUSE for miles and miles.

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It is so easy to think that kids are safe. Someone tried to pick up my sister. Someone tried to pick up me. Some guy pulled his pants down after knocking on the window of his van to get my daughter's attention, and began masturbating. None of these happened in the same city. There are creeps that prey on kids, and parents should warn their child how to protect themselves. Period.

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There were just as many child abductions when we were kids, and we walked to school. Unfortunately, kids today are growing up with no sense of independence when they have to be walked to the door of the classroom every day. People are way too paranoid. I've had parents ask my daughter if she was okay when I've dropped her off in front of the school rather than walking her all the way in. Then, they get a driver's license and they're supposed to know how to function when they've never been out of their parents' sight. It is perfectly safe for a child in a suburban area to walk to school at a time when a whole bunch of other people are also walking/driving to school. The real danger is in more rural areas where there aren't as many witnesses -- which, ironically, is where people feel safer and are more likely to let their kids walk.

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I don't let my kids do anything alone outside. Sorry, let me be the most over protective mother in the world, which is 100% better than my parents generation which did not even think about where we were till dinner. People talk about the good old days when kids could play outside alone all day...

However, EVERY girl I know from Highschool, and college was sexually assaulted or Raped before college.Statistics are that 1 out of 4 girls is raped by the time they go to college. That figure is only the girls that Report it! I grew up in a very wealthy neighborhood by the way.

Parents can still be lazy like my parents generation. If my kids play outside, I am the Mom sitting on the porch. I am usually the only Mom sitting on the porch watching too. It is not painful, and will not kill any Mom to stick around. I hear: "Mom, Look what I can do" And my kids love so much to show me cartwheels.

You would NOT believe how many men slowly drive by and get a big long look at my daughters. It is sick!!! I say Be Careful, you will never regret being Careful!!! You will ALWAYS regret being lazy, and careless with your kids if something happens, and odds are that they will!!!

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People worry too much nowadays.

(Lucky for the pharmaceutical companies who can make a quick buck off anti-anxiety meds.)

Live your lives people!

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