The Amber Alert

Of all the school trips I was ever on, this one was the worst. Everything went wrong. It started with not all the permission forms coming back and got steadily worse from there. The school secretary had to phone three parents.

Now if it was up to me, I would never bother to call. Leave them at school! Wouldn’t this be the perfect opportunity to teach children and even their parents that not being responsible has consequences?

 But no, we had to wait, the bus driver fuming while the secretary called three parents, first calling at home then trying to reach their cells, finally reaching each one. Bus drivers had lunchtime runs every single day. Would they be late for these runs because three children were not responsible enough to get a form back on time? Not to mention all of the reminders sent home in the agendas, the henpecking, the “Johnny remember to bring your permission form!”

It never made sense to me. Were those phone calls to parents recorded? What if there was a school trip accident and all we had to cover the school in case of a lawsuit was the secretary saying she got verbal permission? What then?

So, we’re on the bus. I made my children use the washrooms. Half of them didn’t want to go. Seriously. Grade threes always need to go. My kids had to go to the washroom whether they needed to go or not. But my teaching partner didn’t see things that way. She was a breezy twenty-something who just loved kids. Ok, Johnny, you don’t have to go? Well, go back to the line and so long as you promise me that we won’t need to stop to use the washroom along the way everything will be fine! 

Johnny was so persuasive. We just had to listen to him. The gas station we had to stop at for him to do his business had nineteen-fifties gas pumps. I swear I am not making this up! I think the last time I saw pumps like that was in a 1971 movie by Peter Bogdanovich called “The Last Picture Show.” I checked the men’s washroom and Breezy checked the women’s washroom. No just kidding! One washroom out back with running water. The dizzy fluorescent light buzzed to life, sort of. Rust stains from hard water all the way from the tap to the drain and down onto the lifting tile floor. The toilet was a Canadian Tire replacement with the bowl a bright orange. The door stuck so hard when you closed it just so everyone would know that the washroom was being used.

Johnny didn’t want to step in. I told him it was like Halloween; you know for fun. He still didn’t want to use the washroom. I sighed. Breezy was on the bus singing with the kids. How long could she go with them like that before we would have another problem?

“I don’t want to go in there, it's spooky!”

“That’s the whole point! It’s supposed to scare you!”

“No!” All folded arms and 8-year-old tears. My career flashed before my eyes. The Toronto Star headline, just below the paper’s fold “MALE TEACHER ALONE WITH STUDENT IN WASHROOM!”

“I’ll go in with you!”

My head is pounding. Back to the bus. Johnny was regaling me with how he would never want to use a washroom like that again, never in his life, and that he would be telling his parents all about it.

“Make sure you tell your parents about how it was for Halloween!”

***

We arrived back at the bus Johnny and I, finally. Six other children got up from their seats. I waved them off.

“We’ll chance it,” I said to Breezy. I nodded at our angry bus driver, who clanked our ancient school bus with the fat nose where the engine lived into gear. He immediately ran a red light, going sixty on back roads, kids hollering and screaming at the back of the bus. Bumpity, BUMP! Screams! Yay, this is life! Every other child wants to be in those back seats. I’m sitting with Breezy in the front seat.

“I hope we get there in time!”

Fat chance of that, I think. The first thing we will need to do when we arrive is get the kids to the washrooms. Then break up into groups. I had clipboards with student names and pens for the parent volunteers. We were supposed to have one volunteer for every six students. Who makes up these rules? It was hard enough to get parents who could take time off work let alone ones who had completed and signed criminal reference checks! Made me think about how strange it was to say this out loud in front of the class:

“Make sure your parents have a criminal reference check if they want to volunteer for our trip!”

“My mom is not a criminal!” say half the kids.

Are you sure? I think, making a mental note never to ask that in front of the class again.

***

Shrewd teachers are needed on days like this. Breezy was not one of them. I made sure that all my monkeys were with me. That meant that my group of 10 children had the six boys who always went bananas. I will never forget my first school trip when I was all wet behind the ears, so useless as a teacher, trusting, and hopeful. Four grade sixes jumped off a roof. Into a snowbank! One of them hurt his arm, he was the one that went headfirst! Lucky for me, parents back then still thought that it was up to their children to be responsible. No blaming teachers back then.

Breezy had her monkeys all split up, in groups that hapless parents had to control. I didn’t say anything. To me, parent volunteers were just for show. If a child acted up, volunteer parents would look like baby seals, big-eyed at me, what do I do now? I would always take over.

We arrive finally. A camp counselor type come high school student, welcomes us at the front of our bus. We’re very late, but she is all sparkly.  

“Well, you missed the jamboree! But don’t you worry! There’s still lots of cool stuff to do!” She's breathless and joking about the park rules in a happy sing-song voice. "And most of all! Make sure you have FUN!" Then she switches off, her job done, and wanders away, off to the next very late school bus.

“Listen up!” I say in my big teacher’s voice at the front of the bus. “My children with me, you know who you are. We don’t eat for another hour. Leave your stuff on the bus.”

The bus driver motions to me. I go lean over. He tells me he must leave.

“Correction! Take all your things with you! Eat whatever you want. Then meet me in a single line!”

***

It was a water exhibition. Groups of children could go anywhere to the hundred or so stalls in this huge outdoor park. They could see miniature high school projects depicting water erosion, water treatment, how a toilet works, and live animals who lived near water. Anything to do with water, hosted by the region’s high school students. The weather was sunny, with not a drop in sight.

The time went by quickly. I wasn’t having any problems at all. “Eagle Eyes was what all the children called me. I could tell a child was going to misbehave, just by looking at them. One parent called me over. It was getting near home time, which surprised this parent, one thirty being our departure time.

“We’ve only been here for two hours!”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Buses have to do their regular runs as well as these school trips,” I explained. Which reminded me. Time to get all the children together for the trip back. We had agreed to meet near our bus at one o’clock. My parents were starting to gather with their groups. I did a quick count. Everyone accounted for.

Suddenly, it was Breathless Breezy right behind me. She was in tears.

“Carla, what’s wrong?”

“I can’t find Norman!”

“When did you last see him?” She pointed out a stall near us, one that I hadn’t visited.

“Make water tornados with pop bottles place?” I asked, looking at my map.

“Yes!”

“Have you notified security?”

“No.”

“I’ll call the school. You get over there near the washrooms and get an announcement out.” I pointed. “Do you see the administration tent? Run!”

I was still on the phone, on hold because the school only had three lines, one reserved for the fax machine, when I heard the announcement.

Could Norman Pryzkova please report to anyone wearing a yellow hazard jacket?

I gave up on the school. Linda’s phone number was what I needed. It wasn’t like I had her as a top contact. There it was. Linda, principal, Elmwood School. I call her cell.

“Linda, we’re missing a student.”

“OH NO! Who is it?”

“Norman Pryzkova.” I was pretty sure she didn’t know who I was talking about. P-R-Y-Z-K-O-V-A I spell. Norman had only been at our school for a month. No English, Polish? I wasn’t sure.

“I’ll call the parents. Has there been an alert put out?”

“Yes.”

“Call me back in five minutes!”

Carla was back, biting her nails. Her tears had dried up, but she was breathing heavily and seemed disoriented. I was the senior teacher. We had to get all the kids on the bus.

“Do a roll call!” I barked at her. “Here take my list, get a parent to help you!” The kids were starting to fuss and get upset. The sooner we got them on the bus the better. There could be other students missing.

“Norman’s gone!” all the students started to say. Some were yelling out when they last saw him, two girls started crying. I couldn’t make sense of anything. Too much noise and disorder.

Carla started the bus boarding. She would do the roll call from inside the bus. Good, I thought. I gathered Norman’s group around me, away from the bus. The parent volunteer was with them. I kneeled and lowered my voice.

I want you to answer me one at a time. When was the last time you saw Norman? My phone rang.

“You were supposed to call me back in five minutes!” shouts Linda.

“Sorry.” A heavy-set older man runs up to me from the administration tent, stopping to lean on his knees. I cup the receiver of my cell.

“Is everything all right?” he wheezes. “We sent the alert out. The police are on the way. Firefighters too. We will be shutting all the exhibits early so more people can search for him.”

I nod and get back to Linda.

“WHAT IS GOING ON!” she screeches.

“Calm down Linda,” I say. “Everything that we can do, we are doing."

Apparently, no one can reach Norman’s parents. Emergency contacts were not filled in on Norman’s office information sheet either. Linda said she was going to go to the parent’s house in her car. Maybe they weren’t answering the phone, or nearby neighbors could give more information. She tells me to call back in five minutes.

Kids on the bus started screaming. What now? I think. Fire trucks are pulling into the parking lot. Two police cruisers were with them. How long until an Amber Alert? I wonder. The whole province of Ontario will know that Norman is missing! Every single person in Ontario might get an alert on their cell phone. Pinch me, so I can wake up.

***

It was the worst day of Carla’s life. Her student is missing. If only I could talk to the students who last saw Norman. By the time I got a chance to speak to them, they were too upset to tell me anything.

Back at the school, parents were thick as flies, picking up their bawling children and buzzing around spreading rumors about a family they knew nothing about. We waited long after school was over for news. Finally, we heard from the parents.

Super shy, and wringing their hands, they showed up at the school to explain everything in their broken English. They thought they had to pick up Norman at the park! Everyone apologized, as people do these days. I had a truly massive headache. Carla was beside herself. She was still on a teacher's one-year probation. I could imagine what she was thinking. Linda had a huge staff meeting about the trip the next week. As is always the case, there were more rules to follow to make sure that such a thing never happens again.  

We would have to take emergency sheets with us. The whole idea of having small groups disperse and go anywhere they wanted in a park would no longer be allowed. Never let a child out of your sight for any reason whatsoever was the new rule.

Which made me wonder. How many things going wrong would it take for schools to do away with school trips entirely? A thought, I toyed with. A problem for someone else to solve.