A Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools bus dropped a kindergartener and a fourth grader in an unfamiliar neighborhood on the first day of school. The children spent nearly three hours with a stranger about 20 minutes by car from home.

Ashley Cofield, the children's mother, told WBTV her kids boarded the bus at about 4:15 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 25, after classes at Charles H. Parker Academic Center. They were supposed to arrive home in about 10 minutes. Instead, the bus left them in a north Charlotte neighborhood around 7 p.m.

A stranger found the children and reached Cofield through Facebook with a message: "I'm with your children, please call me." The woman stayed on the phone while Cofield drove to pick them up.

Cofield said the bus driver admitted she did not check street signs before telling the children to get off. Her kids were the last riders on the bus.

CMS requires drivers to check students off as they exit. Transportation Executive Director Delvico Dunn said that procedure was reinforced during back-to-school training, WCNC reported. The district had not responded to WBTV's questions about the Cofield incident as of Wednesday, Aug. 26.

Cofield said she tracked the new AlphaPortal bus app all afternoon but got no useful information about her children's location. The app, which replaced the previous "Here Comes the Bus" system, launched Monday, Aug. 24. On Aug. 25, parent Shavon Owens told WBTV her biggest fear was that a bus would "not know this is her stop and drop her off somewhere else."

The incident happened as CMS operates 750 buses with 98 driver vacancies. District leaders had said before the first day that all routes were covered and they did not expect disruptions. GPS monitors were installed on every bus this year to help drivers learn their routes, according to WBTV's Aug. 25 report.

At the school board meeting Tuesday, Aug. 25, Superintendent Dr. Crystal Hill acknowledged transportation problems. She said the district was confident it could resolve issues in the first week as drivers became more familiar with routes and traffic patterns.

CMS expects 14 to 20 new drivers to finish onboarding within two weeks, with another training class scheduled for September, according to Queen City News.

Cofield said her children were scared to ride the bus again. She said they will not.

Families with CMS transportation concerns can call 980-343-6715.