PRINEVILLE, OR -- The Crook County School District is looking into the actions of a bus driver accused of leaving students on the bus, and going into a Prineville store, Wednesday afternoon. The District’s Jason Carr tells KBND News the students were okay, “It’s just highly inappropriate for a staff member to leave children for any length of time without adult supervision. So, that’s really the biggest concern.”

A parent e-mailed the school after the incident, and posted on social media about it. “Our transportation manager reached out to…there’s about 15 children that ride that particular bus, so she reached out to all of the families and was able to speak with most of them except maybe like two or three last night and explain the situation,” Carr says the parents were told of the next steps in the process, “The driver would be taken off the route, and we would do an internal investigation about what happened.”

The matter of student safety is taken seriously. “Whether it was a few minutes or 15 minutes, it’s just not something that can happen when students are in our care,” said Carr.

A substitute bus driver will cover the summer school route in the meantime.