"She said 'They can't find Carter,'" the child's mother, Taylor Singleton, said.
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It is a phone call Singleton said she never expected from Meridiana Elementary School.
Singleton said the school administration shut down the campus when they realized her son was missing, and the principal even jumped in a car to drive around and search for the pre-K student.
Carter takes the school bus but was dismissed with children who walk home, even though he has a bus rider tag on his backpack.
"How does this happen? He's a 4-year-old walking by himself. Nobody notices anything out of the ordinary?" Singleton said.
It happened on Oct. 27. She said Carter was able to walk nearly a mile down the very busy Meridiana Parkway before being found by another mother near a Starbucks parking lot just yards from 288-Frontage Road.
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"When she said that they saw him close to 288, I immediately broke down because I'm like, 'My son's going to get picked up, or he's going to get hit,'" Singleton said.
Carter was returned to the school safely by police.
Singleton said Meridiana Elementary School told her the dismissal procedures on that Thursday lacked appropriate staffing and the bus rider and walker lines were merged.
Alvin ISD sent this statement to Eyewitness News:
On Thursday, Oct. 27, 2022, a 4-year-old Meridiana Elementary student left campus at dismissal after getting in the "walker" line instead of the "bus rider" line, where he followed other children away from campus. Following this extremely unfortunate situation, Alvin ISD has conducted a thorough review of the safety protocols which led to procedure modifications at Meridiana Elementary. School and District leadership met with the child's parents to assure them that new procedures have now been put in place. This, understandably, is an upsetting situation for all involved and Alvin ISD remains committed to the safety of all our students.
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Singleton said the school and Alvin ISD have apologized to her family, but she wants more assurances and concrete plans for safety protocol changes.
"I understand mistakes happen, but this could have been a mistake that could have cost us our child," she said. "This should have never happened at all."
The family is also looking for the other mother who found little Carter and kept him safe while calling police.
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