BALTIMORE — “If I walk my kids to school when school starts, I"m going to have to walk an hour and 30 minutes," says Amber Cozio.
Cozio is the mother of two who is trying to find a way to get her kids to school in two weeks.
She says she lives next door to Frederick Elementary School which her kids are zoned for, yet the school has them on a waiting list.
In the meantime her kids are attending Charles Carrol Barrister Elementary School.
“Its stressful because its like I feel like I'm getting 10 steps ahead but they are knocking me back all over again," says Amber.
Last school year Amber was homeless, which she says is one of the reasons her kids couldn’t go to the school closest to them.
She says she was hoping it would change now that she has an apartment.
Her kids aren’t the only ones missing school because of transportation.
“Two young girls that were 13 that haven’t been to school in a year, another young man that hadn’t been to school in 5 years," says Dawn Montgomery.
Dawn Montgomery says she has seen this same situation a lot with Baltimore City School students who can’t get access to buses or other means of transportation.
“I was told there was a program in place but when it failed they have never replaced it with anything else,” Dawn said.
Amber says she is worried about what will happen this school year.
“The lady told me in order for them to get on the MTA bus I'm going to have to put my 5 and 6-year-old on the bus by themselves," says Amber.
She says she is even more frustrated because she isn’t getting any answers on what she can do to get her kids bus access to and from school, and she doesn’t want them to miss any more school days.
“We all should speak up because it is not fair because I know a lot of kids, like that's the reason why my brother dropped out of school because he didn’t have transportation, and that's the reason why a lot of kids dropped out of school, for not having the right transportation.”
We reached out to Baltimore City Public Schools and are waiting for a response.
The first day of school for Baltimore City Public Schools is Monday, August 28th.
